You’ve heard the line breastmilk is still best for babies in television. That cliche has been up and running for a reason - it is a true nugget of wisdom. Breastfeeding allows children to get their optimum requirements for nutrients and antibodies and also give mothers more time to bond with their children during infant care.
How optimum is the nutrients in breast milk. Well, like magic, it has the right amount of fat, sugar, water and protein needed by the baby for his growth. It is also easier to digest than cow’s milk. After all, the baby is not a cow. Human breastmilk is much more easier to absorb and break down.
Apart from the nutrients, breast milk has anitbodies to provide important protection against bacteria and viruses. In today’s polluted environment, this is no laughing matter. Breastmilk can really help strengthen your child. It makes babies less susceptible to contract lower respiratory infections, ear infection, septicemia and urinary tract infections.
More importantly, for the mother, breastfeeding helps to lower the risk of breast and ovarian cancer. It also helps the uterus return to its normal size more quickly.
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July 2nd, 2009 at 5:22 pm
I disagree. Breastmilk isn’t best, nor is it optimum; actually it’s nothing more than normal.
If tomorrow someone invented fake blood, wasn’t as good as real blood (around 100 constituents that could not be replicated) but it kept people alive, even if they did get more sick AND they had to then pay for this blood. Would we call real blood “optimum blood”? or would it just be good old regular blood and the other stuff an artificial copy?
Optimum, best, premium are all phrases thought up by (believe it or not) formula companies. It’s a clever marketing trick used in many areas of sales; if you push the competitor as optimum, it allows you to neatly slot in as “ok” or “fine”. If we call breastmilk normal as it is, what does that make formula? deficient, substandard; after all it’s something not anywhere near as good as the model it is attempting to replicate. Most people in life settle for “ok”; we know we should eat lentils galore, go to the gym five times a week but optimum usually sits alongside effort and hardword. Ok is generally easier and acceptable for many (the formula companies target market)
In the UK, the sale of chickens is comparable. The bog standard battery had a crap life chickens are just called “chickens”. The ones that have led any sort of normal chicken existance are “organic” or “free range”. In reality these are just normal chickens, the ones that have had a battery life pumped with antibiotics are substandard, but this wouldn’t sell chickens.
So going back to the blood anology. Would we tell people there were benefits to only accepting real blood? that using real blood could lower their risk of xyz disease and illness? No, what we would say is that there are risks to using artificial blood, that it increases risks of illness. Why when it comes to infant feeding must we turn the argument on it’s head?
July 4th, 2009 at 7:18 am
optimum as used in this context is the amount of child nutrition that is most favorable to his development. So breastmilk in this regard is optimum. At the same time, it is normal. So while the term optimum can be used for hyping, that doesn’t mean the term can’t be used to refer to something that is really optimum.
thanks for the time. i do like the thought process about blood.