Rapid Responses to:
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Rapid Responses: Rapid Responses published:
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![[Read Rapid Response]](/icons/misc/sectionDOWN.gif)
Reaction by the BBC to too much bottle feeding on the screen
- Gill Reese (13 November 2000)
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east enders promotes formula milk for babies
- Christine Mundy (14 November 2000)
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No surprises!
- Arthur Healy (16 November 2000)
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reply by bbc to comlaint re formula promotion
- Christine Mundy (16 November 2000)
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Perhaps a time for social marketing?
- Virginia Thorley (17 November 2000)
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Media Portrayal of Breast feeding reflects personal experience
- Catherine Johnman (1 December 2000)
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lack of information about infant feeding
- Pat Cairney (4 December 2000)
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re media and breastfeeding
- Anne Bramley (8 December 2000)
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Carrot and Stick for the BBC
- Mary E Black (19 November 2001)
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Gill Reese, N/A home
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Some years ago when my children were small we watched a Schools programme about 'how babies are made' from conception to birth. At the end of this 'natural process' they showed the baby being bottle fed. My three year old son jumped up and pointed to the television and proclaimed 'That is silly Mummy'. I was breast feeding his baby sister at that time I agreed with him. I wrote to the BBC about their excellent programme, as indeed most of it was, and told them of my son's reaction and that finishing with bottle feeding the infant spoilt their educational programme. Their reply was, 'that to show the mother breast feeding would make all the bottle fed children, who were watching the programme, feel inadequate'! |
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Christine Mundy, midwife frimley park hospital nhs trust
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i was fortunate to hear this paper presented at the unicef uk baby friendly initiative conference in derby on 9 november by lesley henderson. it was sad to hear that breast feeding is represented in such a negative way in the media. only today nov 13 east enders made several visual references to bottle feeding and also clearly showed the brand of formula milk being used by the young mother. fomula milk advertising is actually banned on the tv. |
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Arthur Healy, Editor, Nutrition Abstracts and Reviews CAB International, Wallingford, UK
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Sir I applaud the paper by Henderson et al. - it highlights the need for fundamental change in attitude towards breast feeding and the indifference of the media towards the public health benefits. The results are in many ways unsurprising to both nutritionists and parents themselves but reemphasize the socioeconomic and political barriers to breast feeding that exist. Social acceptance of breast feeding remains poor, and too often young mothers are forced into smelly and cramped "baby changing areas” in our public places, making social outcasts of the women tasked with nurturing our next generation. Why? So that male sensibilities are not offended at the sight of mammary glands performing a task other than male arousal. Given all the public time and resource that has been devoted to breast feeding awareness, it is lamentable that the prevalence of breast feeding in the UK today is among the lowest in Europe. If public health authorities are serious about improving the rate, the socioeconomic barriers must be addressed: (i) all maternity facilities must offer sustained breast feeding support, at present the level of support varies widely among hospitals, (ii) lactation consultants must be available to all mothers, as conflicting advice from health care workers is commonplace, (iii) education on breast feeding must start early and (iv) childcare provision is desperately inadequate and exacerbates maternal anxieties about breast feeding and returning to the workplace. I appreciate the strains on the NHS but surely the benefits and savings would outweigh the investment. Arthur Healy, BSc
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Christine Mundy, midwife frimley park hospital nhs trust
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Further to my complaint to the BBC of east enders promoting a particular brand of formular milk, I have a reply on my answerphone saying that a long standing "soap" is permitted to show products by name in the name of realism. Also that the young mum would be bottle feeding in her position. I dispute this type casting. There are very young mums who do choose to breast feed and are supported in their choice to do this successfully. This is rather similar to the response given to Gill Reece. |
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Virginia Thorley, Lactation Consultant, private practice Brisbane, Queensland, Australia
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Sir, I congratulate Henderson et al on their paper (BMJ 2000;321:1196-98). It raises no surprises. Perhaps this is the time for health authorities to consider working with the media to create and implement a social marketing initiative, using positive health messages within soap operas or other programs. South Africa had an excellent social marketing initiative when I was there in 1996. Called Soul City, it was based around eight key health messages of which breastfeeding was one, and targeted at low-income women aged 18-35 through a television soap opera, Soul City, a tie-in radio program, and a purpose-written magazine. As in South Africa, market research would need to be done to ascertain the sort of programs which the target group watches and how these could benefit from input. The Henderson article is a good starting point. It would seem from this paper that working mothers from "ordinary" backgrounds need to be portrayed positively, breastfeeding at home and pumping at work. The difficulty would be in convincing writers and producers to accept input without compromising their creativity, and any such health-promotion initiative might need to have a financial contribution towards the shows included in its budget. No matter how well mothers are prepared for breastfeeding prenatally, and how much support they receive while in hospital, after discharge they are likely to abandon breastfeeding early, unless wider community attitudes unsupportive of breastfeeding are addressed. Yours sincerely, Virginia Thorley, MA, IBCLC |
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Catherine Johnman
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Dear Editor - L Henderson states "media coverage implies that breastfeeding is problematic, funny and embarrassing"1. Unfortunately, this is often the case. Initially it is problematic because you are feeding constantly, especially during the night, no one else can feed your child for you, and most mums seem to get cracked nipples at some point. The amusing part occurs when you leak during a consultation with anyone under five and, finally, the embarrassing part is when your trainer tries to come into the room when you are simultaneously reading the BMJ and expressing milk. The media unfortunately does portray the down side of breastfeeding and does not emphasise the benefits but there is no way of knowing if this discourages breastfeeding in any way. In general, the media tends to show bottle-feeding as the norm but again the effects on bottle-feeding rates are unknown. Recently during my stay in a maternity ward, I was shocked to be one of two out of twelve who were breastfeeding. I was even more shocked when the midwife asked a girl across from me how she was going to feed her new baby. The response was "the proper way". For a minute I thought the two had become three but then she said "SMA". Could this be because of the influence of normalisation of bottle-feeding in the media? More research would be required to ascertain directly from mothers how much their attitudes are influenced by media portrayal and how much by personal experience. 1 Henderson L, Kitsinger J, Green J. Representing infant feeding: content analysis of British media portrayals of bottle feeding and breast feeding. BMJ 2000; 321: 1196-1198. Dr Catherine Johnman
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Pat Cairney, midwifery lecturer university of dundee
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I applaude the article, reflecting the cultural assertion of bottle feeding being 'normal', and the media representation of breast feeding. This unfortunate situation further reinforces the feeding choices of women who do not feel able to seek out information, but rely on the readily available sources, which they feel provide the 'right' way. I have just 'done' a one month snapshot of magazines aimed at expectant or new mothers, for their contribution to this topic. I read 9 different publications, bought from a high street newsagent, in late November this year. The total number of articles per magazine was 242 ( average 27, remarkably consistent!). Infant feeding was the subject of fifteen articles in all, broken down into breast feeding - 4, bottle feeding - 1, solid foods - 10. It is easy to assume women find out about infant feeding from professionals, but many underprivileged women rely on these other sources. Perhaps this whole issue needs adding to the health promotion agenda! |
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Anne Bramley, Midwife and NCT Breastfeeding Counsellor Derby
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I was also very lucky to hear Lesley Henderson speak at this year's BFI Conference and support the call for a truthful, factual and helpful portrayal of baby feeding in the British Media. I saw the episode of Eastenders when a trolley containing branded artificial baby milk was displayed extremely close to the camera. This obviously was not in a Baby Friendly hospital where artificial milks are not displayed and are locked away from view. I question the alleged BBC's response reported in BMJ Rapid Responses as I am not aware of any section within the UK Law relating to Advertisement of Baby Milk which makes a special case for the producers of soap operas . Can any one enlighten us as to how or if the BBC or other media producers can display a branded infant milk to thousands of viewers and say this is in artistic and public interest? Kind Regards Anne Bramley |
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Mary E Black, Child protection UNICEF Bosnia and Herzegovina
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The stick.... Reading this series of letters it seems clear that the BBC may have inadvertently contravened the code on advertisement of breast milk substitutes. The easiest way to find out if this is so is to formally report the East Enders episode to the monitoring committee in the UK that oversees violations of the code. It would at least make interesting discussion. Was there any product placement involved by the company? Were they contacted in any way? But do not forget the carrots.... The BBC has used Eastenders to raise many important social and ethical concerns. In this case they seem to have picked a stereotypical portrayal of a young mother - in my clinical practice for at risk youth before I joined UNICEF I did my best to support young mothers to breast feed, and a lot of them did. What was hard for them was getting little support when at home, with family members or when watching television and reading mainstream media. Realism in soap operas is fine but the industry accepts the idea of social responsibility too. So how about information for the BBC on the baby friendly hospital initiative, the code, ideas for some storylines they might run later? And perhaps someone in the UK could collect these reponses and information on infant feeding and media portrayal from the BMJ archives and meet with the Eastenders reasearch team to take them through it? ps we could start an email correspondence here on possible storylines for Eastenders.... Lesley Henderson, Jenny Kitzinger, and Josephine Green BMJ 2000; 321: 1196-1198 [Abstract] [Full text] |
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