Powdered milk ads 'misleading'

[limbo]

HEALTH SEMINAR

Powdered milk ads 'misleading'

 

Experts say producers? claims about brain development are discouraging breastfeeding

 

 

Certain powdered milk manufacturers are misrepresenting information about the DHA and AA contents in their products, nutrition experts said yesterday.

 

Advertisements for some powdered-milk products emphasising that high levels of docosahexaenoic acid (DHA) and arachidonic acid (AA) ? long-chain polyunsaturated fatty acids ? appear to be vital for the brain development of infants have led many mothers to abandon breastfeeding in favour of cow-milk-based products, said Sa-nga Damapong of the Nutrition Association of Thailand.

 

His comments came during a seminar hosted by the Thai Health Foundation after a recent ABAC poll had found that a majority of young mothers in Bangkok said powdered-milk ads had convinced them to choose the cow-milk products over natural breast milk. Almost half of the respondents said they had seen ads for DHA and AA powder-milk products, and 65 per cent of these mothers said they had become convinced of the health benefits to their infants of cow-milk products, Sa-nga said.

 

Thai powdered-milk manufacturers started fortifying their products with DHA and AA four years ago and have since been conducting an intense advertising campaign. Yet ads claiming that products rich in DHA and AA contents were no different from mother?s milk and were essential for babies? mental development were misleading, Sa-nga said.

 

Dr Weerapong Chattranont, an advisor to the Thai Breast Feeding Centre, said the advertising claims were spurious because the ingredients found in natural breast milk were adequate for infants? proper brain development. ?DHA and AA are natural components of [human] breast milk, but they aren?t natural in cow-milk products so manufacturers have to add these two fatty acids into their products,? he said. ?Nonetheless, [such products] cannot compete with breast milk, which has more than 100 nutritional substances including those that boost nerve growth.?

 

He urged authorities to emulate countries that have banned powdered milk ads for infants as well as any marketing for infant products in order to protect young babies? fragile physiology and underdeveloped immune systems from becoming prey to products bolstered by suspect claims.

 

Another speaker, Dr Kusuma Chusilpa from Khon Kaen University?s Medical Science Faculty, pointed out that neither DHA nor AA could yet be adequately extracted, so what manufacturers in fact did was add linoleic acid and linolenic omega-6 fatty acids, which the infants? body can turn into DHA and AA.

 

?We don?t know exactly how much of these fatty acids to put in formulae. Besides, there?s no confirmation that DHA and AA truly support infants? brain development and not do harm in the long run,? she added.

 

Duangkamon Sajirawattanakul

 

The Nation 22/02/2006

[vaginaholic]

Didn't Nestle have big problems with misleading advertising in the Phillipines some years ago?

 

If I remember correctly they had to completely change all the labeling for all their milk products.