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Archived Comments for: Is breastfeeding really invisible, or did the health care system just choose not to notice it?

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  1. Invisible research

    Valerie McClain, n/a

    14 August 2008

    Invisible is a great description of the reality of breastfeeding in the USA. It is also a perfect description of breastfeeding and human milk research.

    We have a mountain of research on human milk and its components but far less research on the process of giving that milk-breastfeeding. That mountain is shrouded in the mists of intellectual property rights.

    Chris Mulford gives an accurate description of where breastfeeding stands in the USA, invisible. But I have to say that I believe that the lacking of basic and applied research is not the reason for invisibility. Patenting of human milk components and human milk itself has created the need for invisibility, secrecy. We have way over 2000 human milk patents and patent applications dating from as early as 1980.

    For instance the Ramsay team includes Peter Hartmann who at the moment is co-inventor to numerous patent applications in the USA, most of which are owned by Medela. [entitled: Human Milk Fortifiers & Methods of Making & Using Same, Treatment of Mother's Milk, Method for isolating cells from mammary secretion, Method for Analysing & Treating Human Milk and System Therefore] Elena Medo and employees of Prolacta Biscience are co-inventors to a patent application called, "Human Milk Compositions & Methods of Making & Using Same." Thus a growing, competititive industry on uses of human milk, as a substitute for breastfeeding, has birthed itself in almost total privacy and invisibility.

    We have stem cells in human milk. We shouldn't be surprised about this recent media announcement. Ruth Lawrence's textbook in 1994 mentions stem cells in human milk. Stampfer's work in the late 70's and 80's used human epithelial cells (HMEC) from human milk and mammoplasties to create a line of cultured cells that are still used in research. (patent owned by the USA)

    Patenting creates invisibility. It also creates a distortion of our reality. Lack of research is not the problem. It is the gold rush of claims on a natural resource, human milk, that is jeopardizing breastfeeding. Many thanks to Chris Mulford for making an invisible problem visible.

    Competing interests

    none

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