Breastmilk Should Be Counted in GDP
The Lancet calls for an end to infant formula marketing
On February 7, 2023, the Lancet, a peer-reviewed medical journal founded in England in 1823, published a three-paper series on the predatory tactics of the commercial infant formula industry. The Lancet is to be commended for recommending an end to the marketing of infant formula.
For decades, the commercial milk formula industry has used underhand marketing strategies, designed to prey on parents’ fears and concerns, to turn the feeding of infants and young children into a multibillion-dollar business — generating revenues of about $55 billion each year.
The 2023 Lancet series highlights the UN’s International Code of Marketing of Breast-milk Substitutes, a set of consensus recommendations created in 1981 to prevent the inappropriate marketing of infant formula. Among its standards are:
- No formula advertising to the public
- No formula advertising promotion within health-care systems
- No free formula samples to mothers, health-care workers or in health facilities
As of March 2016, 135 countries had at least some form of legal measure in place covering some provisions of the Code. This represents significant progress since 2011, when only 103…
