<\/p>\n
The report draws on interviews with parents, pregnant women and health workers in eight countries, also uncovered systematic and unethical marketing strategies used by the formula milk industry \u2013 now worth a staggering US$55 billion \u2013to influence parents\u2019 infant feeding decisions.<\/p>\n
The report found that industry marketing techniques include unregulated and invasive online targeting; sponsored advice networks and help lines; promotions and free gifts; and practices to influence training and recommendations among health workers.<\/p>\n
The messages that parents and health workers receive are often misleading, scientifically unsubstantiated, and violate the International Code of Marketing of Breast-milk Substitutes (the Code) \u2013a landmark public health agreement passed by the World Health Assembly in 1981 to protect mothers from aggressive marketing practices by the baby food industry.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis report shows very clearly that formula milk marketing remains unacceptably pervasive, misleading and aggressive,\u201d said Dr. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, WHO Director-General. \u201cRegulations on exploitative marketing must be urgently adopted and enforced to protect children\u2019s health.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cFalse and misleading messages about formula feeding are a substantial barrier to breastfeeding, which we know is best for babies and mothers,\u201d said UNICEF Executive Director, Catherine Russell. \u201cWe need robust policies, legislation and investments in breastfeeding to ensure that women are protected from unethical marketing practices, and have access to the information and support they need to raise their families.\u201d<\/p>\n
To address these challenges, WHO, UNICEF and partners are calling on governments, health workers, and the baby food industry to end exploitative formula milk marketing and fully implement and abide by the International Code of Marketing of Breast-milk Substitutes.<\/p>\n
They also called for increased investments in policies and programmes to support breastfeeding, including adequate paid parental leave in line with international standards, and ensuring high quality breastfeeding support.<\/p>\n
\u201cRequesting industry to publicly commit to full compliance with the Code and subsequent World Health Assembly resolutions globally and banning health workers from accepting sponsorship from companies that market foods for infants and young children for scholarships, awards, grants, meetings, or events,\u201d the report said.<\/p>\n
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The report draws on interviews with parents, pregnant women and health workers in eight countries, also uncovered systematic and unethical marketing strategies used by the formula milk industry \u2013 now worth a staggering US$55 billion \u2013to influence parents\u2019 infant feeding decisions. The report found that industry marketing techniques include unregulated and invasive online targeting; sponsored […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1022446,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[72],"tags":[353,1537,6189,6190,3020,5022,1133,1584,681,6191],"class_list":["post-1022445","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-business","tag-breach","tag-companies","tag-feeding","tag-formula","tag-infant","tag-intl","tag-milk","tag-report","tag-standards","tag-unicef"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/2022\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1022445","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/2022\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/2022\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/2022\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/2022\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1022445"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/2022\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1022445\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/2022\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1022445"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/2022\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1022445"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/2022\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1022445"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}