There are two days left before the health campaign "Your child is what you eat" of the Society of Pediatrics of Rio Grande do Sul Brazil is made public in a press conference and has already become known for two reasons: one, that the photos are very striking and invite reflection and two, that the reflection it provokes is not always what the authors of the same expected.
And what they intended was to send a healthy message, advice to pregnant moms and breastfeeding so that they feed properly and that way the baby is well fed and the shot has gone out through the butt, because they have managed to encourage mothers to give artificial milk.
Is it for pregnant women or those who breastfeed?
When a woman is pregnant share nutrients and share habits with the fetus. What he eats and what he drinks will also be received by the baby, and that is why it is the stage that we could consider more delicate at the nutritional level.
Will the baby be what the mother eats? More or less yes, that is why the ideal thing is for a pregnant woman to have a balanced diet in which she does not consume alcohol and in which she does not abuse foods that can be harmful.
We know, for example, that a balanced diet decreases the risk of preterm birth, that if the diet is high in fiber there is less risk of preeclampsia and we know that when a woman feeds mostly fast food during pregnancy, the baby will do the same when you have the opportunity to try it and ask for it.
We also know that it is not recommended to lose weight when you are pregnant, because there may be nutritional and caloric deficiencies that make the baby not only does not develop so well, but also has to end up feeding on the fat of the mother, her deposits, in a process that releases toxins that also reach the fetus, altering your brain development.
All this to say that if the campaign, which we have known through Pulzo, is aimed at pregnant women makes sense: what you eat is what the baby will be, so feed yourself well.
But it seems that no, which is aimed at pregnant women and infants, because if we read what it puts in the chest of women (costs a little, but more or less understood), we see this:
Your habits in the first thousand days of pregnancy can prevent your child from developing serious diseases.
A thousand days of gestation? That does not exist! It would be a pregnancy of almost 3 years! So we deduce that they refer to the 9 months of pregnancy and the next 2 years of the baby's life.
And that's when everything loses meaning, because if the pictures had drawn a baby drawn in a big pregnant belly, eating a hamburger or drinking a soda would have been great, but when the image focuses on breastfeeding, everything falls apart.
In breastfeeding, feeding is not so relevant
Everything falls apart because if you focus on breastfeeding, the slogan loses strength. If the baby is already born, if the mother's milk is being fed, the process is no longer direct. They are no longer the exact nutrients that the mother consumes those that reach the baby, but that It is your milk, processed and "manufactured" based on what your body wants to offer your baby, and in that case, the body is so wise that it is able to discriminate nutrients to always offer the baby a balanced diet.
What happens when a mother thinks that her child does not gain enough weight because her milk is bad, that it is not of quality? He is immediately told to remove that from his head, because We know that all women have nutritious milk for their babies. Another thing is that it produces enough for the baby, or that the baby is able to extract it effectively. In these cases the baby will not gain enough weight, but it will not be because of the composition of the milk, but because the stomach does not get all that it needs.
So, what does it tell a mother that her baby is eating hamburgers, soda and saturated fat directly, as if breast milk were that when the mother eats it? To what they have not succeeded with the campaign, that they have been wrong and that they have achieved what they did not expect, that many women believe what it is not, that they think that breastfeeding is fragile, that they cannot even drink a Coke or a hamburger and that this pressure ends up being an incentive to give artificial milk: "Uff, well, if I can't eat anything, I give him artificial milk, which won't have the gas from the soda or the fats from a hamburger or the calories from the ice cream I just ate."
I know women who have decided to stop breastfeeding in order to smoke because they thought that tobacco went through milk when the negative for the baby is not that, but the mere fact of smoking (In fact, if you smoke, the best thing you can give your child is the chest). That being the case, many women will feel that they cannot do anything, that they cannot eat any of that, and many will not endure long breastfeeding. And not because they have a need or desire to eat fast food, but also because it is a social issue: one day everyone goes to a hamburger shop and while everyone asks for what they want, the mother of the breastfed baby asks for a salad, water and for dessert, a decaffeinated coffee, with just a little sugar, will not make the kid feel bad. And all because in a campaign they peeked when they sent the message to the mothers.
And what does a woman who breastfeed have to eat?
Well exactly the same as a woman who gives the bottle: whatever she wants to eat. Yes you should limit yourself a little in alcohol consumption because it passes into milk, but something can be drunk. For the rest, a woman who breastfeeds should continue a balanced diet, which is exactly the same diet as a woman who does not breastfeed and even a woman who is not even a mother.
A balanced diet is the one that parents of breastfed babies and parents of non-breastfed babies should also take, which is the same diet that breastfed children should take when they start eating.
And can you eat junk food on a balanced diet? Well man, if you are going to eat this meal once or twice a month yes, of course, absolutely nothing happens. Now, if you are going to do it very often, being part of what you eat every day, or every week, then the diet is no longer as balanced and therefore will not be as healthy, independently, again, of whether you give or not the chest. Come on if you eat fatal, the best thing you can give your child is breast milk, but try to eat better, because you end up feeling bad.
The SPRS issues a statement defending itself
Yesterday the SPRS decided to publish a statement in defense of the campaign, explaining that there is no commercial firm behind and that the intention is not to discourage mothers from breastfeeding, but quite the opposite.
They say that as a Pediatric Society they defend breastfeeding over any other type of infant feeding and that the only thing they want is to show mothers the importance of having a good diet.
Too bad the message has been distorted along the way, resulting in a failed campaign (If what you achieve in the end is to send a message that you did not want to give, the publicity is wrong) and pity that, being in time to remove it, keep going.
