[ozmidwifery] "formula lunches"

[Jackie Kitschke]

I have seen this sponsorhip of lunches midwives and doctors in a few different settings. ie. "An update of a new formula in a private hospital setting. The rep was raving on about what they had put in their formula to improve it. I asked her how did they know how much to put in ( I think she was talking about the fish oils). She looked at me as asked me what I meant. I said that individual women make individual milk for their babies and so how would the formula company be able to replicate this? And how did they plan to get olligosaccarids into the milk. She was annoyed. After the chat she provided afternoon tea that all of my colleues wandered off to and thought I was a bit silly when I refused to partake.   Another day an infant feeding session at breakfast time was scheduled at a public hospital with a neonatal doctor speaking an Sponsored by a formula company. I complained to the organisers and said I wasn't coming because of this and told them of the conflict of interest.  They said noone from the formula company would be speaking. I said they didn't need to.    And lastly a domicillary midwives meeting a few years ago was sponsored by a formula company in the form of lunch at a cafe. When I questioned them on this they told me that there wasn't any signs up or anything and so noone would know and it wouldn't influence their work practices. I asked if this type of advertising didn't work why would they do it. I also asked them to ponder how much money over the working life of a midwife we could potentially make them if we recommended their formula to women. So if I was going to do free advertising for a company (and sell my soul to the devil)  then if would take more than a $10-$20 buck cafe lunch, more like a 2 month trip abroad. I wouldn't be so cheap!!! It is the same in a way as people who use all the pens and lanyards that drug companys hand out. I think it is naive to think that this doesn't matter in the whole scheme of things when these company's know it does and that we can be so easliy bought to do their campaining for them.   By the way this is still a Nestle free zone even though my husband still misses his Nescafe coffee.   Thats my rave for today. Jackie