The Politics of Breastfeeding Quotes

“In spite of lip service paid to domestic duties, in 1881 the Census excluded women’s household chores from the category of productive work and, for the first time, housewives were classified as unoccupied.”
― Gabrielle Palmer, The Politics of Breastfeeding: When Breasts are Bad for Business

“Doctors, however, are just as vulnerable to marketing tactics as the rest of us; companies merely use different methods to seduce them.”
― Gabrielle Palmer, The Politics of Breastfeeding: When Breasts are Bad for Business

“The hospital’s endorsement of early artificial feeding conveyed the idea that it was a safe feeding method.”
― Gabrielle Palmer, The Politics of Breastfeeding: When Breasts are Bad for Business

“No amount of advice will prevent the women from carrying on this deadly habit.” This was written in 1917, but the attitude was still around in 1952 when clinic nurses were advising mothers that seven to nine months was the desirable length of time for breastfeeding.”
― Gabrielle Palmer, The Politics of Breastfeeding: When Breasts are Bad for Business

“Damaging hospital practices made breastfeeding a near-impossible procedure and only women with alternative sources of support and knowledge were able to do it.”
― Gabrielle Palmer, The Politics of Breastfeeding: When Breasts are Bad for Business

“misguided propaganda on infant feeding should be punished as the most miserable form of sedition, and that these deaths should be regarded as murder.”
― Gabrielle Palmer, The Politics of Breastfeeding: When Breasts are Bad for Business

“The commercial and medical pressures to use artificial milks would have kept breastmilk supplies low.”
― Gabrielle Palmer, The Politics of Breastfeeding: When Breasts are Bad for Business

“There are no memorials to the thousands of women who died prematurely through extreme physical hardship. These were the women who produced and serviced the workers who created the wealth and consequent power of Europe and North America.”
― Gabrielle Palmer, The Politics of Breastfeeding: When Breasts are Bad for Business

“Women’s role in the development of trade unions has been significant and yet underrecognised.”
― Gabrielle Palmer, The Politics of Breastfeeding: When Breasts are Bad for Business

“US black women are three times more likely to die than white women from causes related to pregnancy and childbirth, and this disparity has widened in the 21st century.”
― Gabrielle Palmer, The Politics of Breastfeeding: When Breasts are Bad for Business

“Black women have suffered more coercion into sterilisation or the use of riskier forms of contraception.30”
― Gabrielle Palmer, The Politics of Breastfeeding: When Breasts are Bad for Business

“sleeping ‘through the night’, even for adults, is a particularly modern concept linked with industrialisation.”
― Gabrielle Palmer, The Politics of Breastfeeding: When Breasts are Bad for Business

“The German word for breastfeeding, ‘Stillen’, means to quieten and soothe as well as to give the breast.”
― Gabrielle Palmer, The Politics of Breastfeeding: When Breasts are Bad for Business

“When researchers looked at all the possible means of preventing infant and young child death they found that improving breastfeeding practices could prevent more deaths than any other single strategy; even more than such key benefits as the provision of safe water, sanitation, immunisation and medical services.”
― Gabrielle Palmer, The Politics of Breastfeeding: When Breasts are Bad for Business

“In every country, rich or poor, thousands of babies are treated for illness every day because they are given foods and fluids other than breastmilk.”
― Gabrielle Palmer, The Politics of Breastfeeding: When Breasts are Bad for Business

“The influence of bottle-feeding makes many people think that ‘nipple sucking’ is breastfeeding. It is not. If the baby sucks his mother’s nipples as he would a bottle teat, it damn well hurts.”
― Gabrielle Palmer, The Politics of Breastfeeding: When Breasts are Bad for Business

“Almost in their sleep, mothers respond, stroke and suckle their babies throughout the night. All the mothers unconsciously sleep in a special position, arm above their babies’ heads and knees drawn up, which protects their babies from harm.7”
― Gabrielle Palmer, The Politics of Breastfeeding: When Breasts are Bad for Business

“The current political climate is now one where the enduring marriage between doctors and baby food companies has spread into a veritable orgy of passion between big business, governments and the UN agencies.”
― Gabrielle Palmer, The Politics of Breastfeeding: When Breasts are Bad for Business

“Between 1983 and 1991, the AAP received contributions from infant formula companies which amounted to US$8.3 million, in addition to the income from journal advertisements and design costs of hospital paediatric clinics.17”
― Gabrielle Palmer, The Politics of Breastfeeding: When Breasts are Bad for Business

“An analysis of the effect of sponsorship on doctors showed that 61% of physicians believe that promotions do not influence their own practice, but only 16% believed this about other physicians.”
― Gabrielle Palmer, The Politics of Breastfeeding: When Breasts are Bad for Business

“Health worker practices have proved hard to change, because the commercial links have become such an intrinsic part of their lives.”
― Gabrielle Palmer, The Politics of Breastfeeding: When Breasts are Bad for Business

“Infant formula samples are placed in ‘discharge bags’ full of promotional products. These are presented as attractive gifts when in fact they are snares to entrap women at their most vulnerable.”
― Gabrielle Palmer, The Politics of Breastfeeding: When Breasts are Bad for Business

“Handing out a free sample is taking a stand against breastfeeding.”
― Gabrielle Palmer, The Politics of Breastfeeding: When Breasts are Bad for Business

“12. Manufacturers and distributors should comply with the Code (and all subsequent WHA Resolutions on infant feeding) independently of any government action to implement it.”
― Gabrielle Palmer, The Politics of Breastfeeding: When Breasts are Bad for Business

“11. All products should be of a high quality and take account of the climatic and storage conditions of the country where they are to be used.”
― Gabrielle Palmer, The Politics of Breastfeeding: When Breasts are Bad for Business

“10. Unsuitable products should not be promoted for babies.”
― Gabrielle Palmer, The Politics of Breastfeeding: When Breasts are Bad for Business

“9. All information on artificial feeding, including labels, should explain the benefits of breastfeeding and warn of the costs and hazards associated with artificial feeding.”
― Gabrielle Palmer, The Politics of Breastfeeding: When Breasts are Bad for Business

“8. Governments should ensure that objective and consistent information is provided on infant and young child feeding.”
― Gabrielle Palmer, The Politics of Breastfeeding: When Breasts are Bad for Business

“6. Labels should be in an appropriate language and have no words or pictures idealising artificial feeding.”
― Gabrielle Palmer, The Politics of Breastfeeding: When Breasts are Bad for Business

“5. No gifts or personal samples to health workers or their families.”
― Gabrielle Palmer, The Politics of Breastfeeding: When Breasts are Bad for Business