[Civsoc-mw] screwed up US policy

[Keyboard Boyd Kilembey]

Goodly, hewe povo mother's know better about breast feeding. They don't
need a useless resolution

On Mon, 9 Jul 2018, 14:41 , <cammack at mweb.co.za> wrote:

> *U.S. Opposition to Breast-Feeding Resolution Stuns World Health Officials
> *
>
> *https://www.nytimes.com/2018/07/08/health/world-health-breastfeeding-ecuador-trump.html
> <https://www.nytimes.com/2018/07/08/health/world-health-breastfeeding-ecuador-trump.html>
> *
>
> Image[image:
> https://static01.nyt.com/images/2018/07/09/business/09breastfeeding-1-sub-2/merlin_74866264_0e99440c-95bc-40f5-8b74-c30bc48e93e4-articleLarge.jpg?quality=75&auto=webp&disable=upscale]
>
> A Brooklyn mother unable to nurse fed her child donated breast milk. The
> $70 billion infant formula industry has seen sales flatten in wealthy
> countries in recent years.CreditJames Estrin/The New York Times
>
> By Andrew Jacobs <http://www.nytimes.com/by/andrew-jacobs>
>
>    - July 8, 2018
>
>
>
> ·  ·  A resolution to encourage breast-feeding was expected to be
> approved quickly and easily by the hundreds of government delegates who
> gathered this spring in Geneva for the United Nations-affiliated World
> Health Assembly.
>
> Based on decades of research, the resolution says that mother’s milk is
> healthiest for children and countries should strive to limit the inaccurate
> or misleading marketing of breast milk substitutes.
>
> Then the United States delegation, embracing the interests of infant
> formula manufacturers, upended the deliberations.
>
> American officials sought to water down the resolution by removing
> language that called on governments to “protect, promote and support
> breast-feeding” and another passage that called on policymakers to restrict
> the promotion of food products that many experts say can have deleterious
> effects on young children.
>
> Advertisement
>
> When that failed, they turned to threats, according to diplomats and
> government officials who took part in the discussions. Ecuador, which had
> planned to introduce the measure, was the first to find itself in the cross
> hairs.
>
> The Americans were blunt: If Ecuador refused to drop the resolution,
> Washington would unleash punishing trade measures and withdraw crucial
> military aid. The Ecuadorean government quickly acquiesced.
>
> *[Like the Science Times page on Facebook. <http://on.fb.me/1paTQ1h>* *|
> Sign up for the Science Times newsletter. <http://nyti.ms/1MbHaRU>]*
>
> The showdown over the issue was recounted by more than a dozen
> participants from several countries, many of whom requested anonymity
> because they feared retaliation from the United States.
>
> Health advocates scrambled to find another sponsor for the resolution, but
> at least a dozen countries, most of them poor nations in Africa and Latin
> America, backed off, citing fears of retaliation, according to officials
> from Uruguay, Mexico and the United States.
>
> “We were astonished, appalled and also saddened,” said Patti Rundall, the
> policy director of the British advocacy group Baby Milk Action, who has
> attended meetings of the assembly, the decision-making body of the World
> Health Organization, since the late 1980s.
>
> “What happened was tantamount to blackmail, with the U.S. holding the
> world hostage and trying to overturn nearly 40 years of consensus on the
> best way to protect infant and young child health,” she said.
>
> In the end, the Americans’ efforts were mostly unsuccessful. It was the
> Russians who ultimately stepped in to introduce the measure — and the
> Americans did not threaten them.
>
> The State Department declined to respond to questions, saying it could not
> discuss private diplomatic conversations. The Department of Health and
> Human Services, the lead agency in the effort to modify the resolution,
> explained the decision to contest the resolution’s wording but said H.H.S.
> was not involved in threatening Ecuador.
>
> “The resolution as originally drafted placed unnecessary hurdles for
> mothers seeking to provide nutrition to their children,” an H.H.S.
> spokesman said in an email. “We recognize not all women are able to
> breast-feed for a variety of reasons. These women should have the choice
> and access to alternatives for the health of their babies, and not be
> stigmatized for the ways in which they are able to do so.” The spokesman
> asked to remain anonymous in order to speak more freely.
>
> Although lobbyists from the baby food industry attended the meetings in
> Geneva, health advocates said they saw no direct evidence that they played
> a role in Washington’s strong-arm tactics. The $70 billion industry, which
> is dominated by a handful of American and European companies, has seen
> sales flatten in wealthy countries in recent years, as more women embrace
> breast-feeding. Over all, global sales are expected to rise by 4 percent in
> 2018, according to Euromonitor, with most of that growth occurring in
> developing nations.
>
> The intensity of the administration’s opposition to the breast-feeding
> resolution stunned public health officials and foreign diplomats, who
> described it as a marked contrast to the Obama administration, which
> largely supported W.H.O.’s longstanding policy of encouraging
> breast-feeding.
>
> During the deliberations, some American delegates even suggested the
> United States might cut its contribution to the W.H.O., several negotiators
> said. Washington is the single largest contributor
> <http://www.who.int/about/finances-accountability/funding/2018-19_AC_Summary.pdf?ua=1>
> to the health organization, providing $845 million, or roughly 15 percent
> of its budget, last year.
>
> The confrontation was the latest example of the Trump administration
> siding with corporate interests on numerous public health and environmental
> issues.
>
> In talks to renegotiate the North American Free Trade Agreement, the
> Americans have been pushing for language
> <https://www.nytimes.com/2018/03/20/world/americas/nafta-food-labels-obesity.html>
> that would limit the ability of Canada, Mexico and the United States to put
> warning labels on junk food and sugary beverages, according to a draft of
> the proposal reviewed by The New York Times.
>
> During the same Geneva meeting where the breast-feeding resolution was
> debated, the United States succeeded in removing statements supporting soda
> taxes from a document that advises countries grappling with soaring rates
> of obesity.
>
> The Americans also sought, unsuccessfully, to thwart a W.H.O. effort
> <http://www.ip-watch.org/2018/05/24/wha-agrees-drafting-roadmap-access-medicines-vaccines-us-blasts-compulsory-licences/>
> aimed at helping poor countries obtain access to lifesaving medicines.
> Washington, supporting the pharmaceutical industry, has long resisted calls
> to modify patent laws as a way of increasing drug availability in the
> developing world, but health advocates say the Trump administration has
> ratcheted up its opposition to such efforts.
>
> The delegation’s actions in Geneva are in keeping with the tactics of an
> administration that has been upending alliances and long-established
> practices across a range of multilateral organizations, from the Paris
> climate accord to the Iran nuclear deal to Nafta.
>
> Ilona Kickbusch, director of the Global Health Centre at the Graduate
> Institute of International and Development Studies in Geneva, said there
> was a growing fear that the Trump administration could cause lasting damage
> to international health institutions like the W.H.O. that have been vital
> in containing epidemics like Ebola and the rising death toll from diabetes
> and cardiovascular disease in the developing world.
>
> “It’s making everyone very nervous, because if you can’t agree on health
> multilateralism, what kind of multilateralism can you agree on?” Ms.
> Kickbusch asked.
>
> A Russian delegate said the decision to introduce the breast-feeding
> resolution was a matter of principle.
>
> “We’re not trying to be a hero here, but we feel that it is wrong when a
> big country tries to push around some very small countries, especially on
> an issue that is really important for the rest of the world,” said the
> delegate, who asked not to be identified because he was not authorized to
> speak to the media.
>
> He said the United States did not directly pressure Moscow to back away
> from the measure. Nevertheless, the American delegation sought to wear down
> the other participants through procedural maneuvers in a series of meetings
> that stretched on for two days, an unexpectedly long period.
>
> In the end, the United States was largely unsuccessful. The final
> resolution preserved most of the original wording, though American
> negotiators did get language removed that called on the W.H.O. to provide
> technical support to member states seeking to halt “inappropriate promotion
> of foods for infants and young children.”
>
> The United States also insisted that the words “evidence-based” accompany
> references to long-established initiatives that promote breast-feeding,
> which critics described as a ploy that could be used to undermine programs
> that provide parents with feeding advice and support.
>
> Elisabeth Sterken, director of the Infant Feeding Action Coalition in
> Canada, said four decades of research have established the importance of
> breast milk, which provides essential nutrients as well as hormones and
> antibodies that protect newborns against infectious disease.
>
> A 2016 study in The Lancet
> <https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6736(16)00210-5/fulltext>found
> that universal breast-feeding would prevent 800,000 child deaths a year
> across the globe and yield $300 billion in savings
> <https://www.unicef.org.uk/babyfriendly/lancet-increasing-breastfeeding-worldwide-prevent-800000-child-deaths-every-year/>
> from reduced health care costs and improved economic outcomes for those
> reared on breast milk.
>
> Scientists are loath to carry out double-blind studies that would provide
> one group with breast milk and another with breast milk substitutes. “This
> kind of ‘evidence-based’ research would be ethically and morally
> unacceptable,” Ms. Sterken said.
>
> Abbott Laboratories, the Chicago-based company that is one of the biggest
> players in the $70 billion baby food market, declined to comment.
>
> Nestlé, the Switzerland-based food giant with significant operations in
> the United States, sought to distance itself from the threats against
> Ecuador and said the company would continue to support the international
> code
> <http://www.who.int/nutrition/publications/infantfeeding/code_report2018/en/>
> on the marketing of breast milk substitutes, which calls on governments to
> regulate the inappropriate promotion of such products and to encourage
> breast-feeding.
>
> In addition to the trade threats, Todd C. Chapman, the United States
> ambassador to Ecuador, suggested in meetings with officials in Quito, the
> Ecuadorean capital, that the Trump administration might also retaliate by
> withdrawing the military assistance it has been providing in northern
> Ecuador, a region wracked by violence spilling across the border
> <https://www.forbes.com/sites/riskmap/2018/05/01/violence-shocks-ecuador-as-colombias-woes-spread-south/#22bcce7672f2>
> from Colombia, according to an Ecuadorean government official who took part
> in the meeting.
>
> The United States Embassy in Quito declined to make Mr. Chapman available
> for an interview.
>
> “We were shocked because we didn’t understand how such a small matter like
> breast-feeding could provoke such a dramatic response,” said the Ecuadorean
> official, who asked not to be identified because she was afraid of losing
> her job.
>
> Wesley Tomaselli contributed reporting from Colombia.
>
> A version of this article appears in print on July 9, 2018, on Page A1 of
> the New York edition with the headline: U.S. Delegation Disrupts Accord On
> Breast Milk. Order Reprints <http://www.nytreprints.com/> | Today’s Paper
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