The US is Against Breast Feeding<\/p>\n
The nations of the world gathered together in Geneva for the World Health Assembly this spring.\u00a0 The Assembly is the driving force behind the United Nation\u2019s World Health Organization, the leading agency involving in improving life expectancy and battling disease, particularly in the under-developed nations.<\/p>\n
The Assembly was preparing to pass a resolution endorsing mothers breast feeding their babies.\u00a0 The resolution didn\u2019t say that mothers shouldn\u2019t use formula, it simply said that all of the scientific evidence showed that breast feeding was the best, if possible.\u00a0 It was a \u201cno brainer\u201d to pass, and Ecuador sponsored the resolution.<\/p>\n
The United States opposed it.\u00a0 The US delegation tried to water down the language, ignoring the science.\u00a0 And when they couldn\u2019t get that done, the US threatened Ecuador with removing military aid and adding punishing trade measures.\u00a0Ecuador, of course, backed down.<\/p>\n
There is a lot of concern that the current President is \u201cignorant\u201d of science; willing to discount scientific facts.\u00a0 To many of its opponents, the Trump Administration flies in the face of common sense when it comes to issues like climate change, pollution, and now, breast feeding.\u00a0 But the Administration isn\u2019t working from ignorance.<\/p>\n
It\u2019s about money.<\/p>\n
It\u2019s about Nestle (that\u2019s Gerber) and Abbott Labs and Bristol-Myers Squibb.\u00a0\u00a0 These are the formula manufacturers who saw the World Health Assembly resolution as a threat to their world markets.\u00a0 Regardless of the science, the US delegation to the Assembly was more interested in sales, then in the health of the world.\u00a0 And it wasn\u2019t just a \u201cgood fight\u201d effort, the US threatened and bullied Ecuador into dropping the resolution (ironically, picked up and pushed through by Russia \u2013 they didn\u2019t like to see little countries bullied. The US didn\u2019t threaten them.)<\/p>\n
The same can be said for many of the changes the Environmental Protection Agency is trying to make to pollution regulations.\u00a0 From allowing greater emissions from chemical plants to automobiles; the Trump Administration is making sure oil, chemical and car companies can maximize profits.\u00a0The theory:\u00a0 if business is doing well, the economy will do well.\u00a0 It worked in the 1950\u2019s.<\/p>\n
In the 1950\u2019s the US expanded manufacturing at the expense of the environment.\u00a0 While the 1950\u2019s are now looked back (by some) with nostalgia; forgotten are the smog alerts, the burning rivers, the dying lake and streams and the abandoned towns.\u00a0 We traded those things for a \u201cbetter economy,\u201d and paid the price with two generations of cleanup.\u00a0 That work still is not complete.<\/p>\n
We are well on the way to creating that environmental damage again.\u00a0 The Trump Administration is taking the short-term profits against the long-term damage.\u00a0 But it\u2019s not out of ignorance.\u00a0 It\u2019s the groups like the Koch Brothers, millions of dollars in political support, that has bought this policy.\u00a0 Koch Industries, a major petro-chemical company, gets what it wants by buying politicians.\u00a0 They aren\u2019t the only one, the car industry, the chemical industry, the petroleum industry and the baby formula industry are all putting their money on the line.<\/p>\n
There\u2019s not a lot of political money coming from the \u201cenvironmental\u201d side of the equation.\u00a0There\u2019s not a lot of support to be had \u00a0from the \u201cbreast feeding lobby.” \u00a0So the current Administration has no problem aggressively trading the future for the present.\u00a0 Ask Ecuador.<\/p>\n
What are the long-term consequences?\u00a0 The United States is now ignoring global warming, having scrubbed the term from many government websites.\u00a0 There is no scientific argument:\u00a0 human pollution is a direct contributor to warming.\u00a0 Warming is changing our environment, from more powerful storms and droughts, to rising ocean levels that threaten our coasts.\u00a0 We are losing the opportunity to deflect even greater changes by allowing greater pollution.\u00a0 But that doesn\u2019t matter.<\/p>\n
And it doesn\u2019t matter that third-world nations won\u2019t receive support to encourage women to breast feed their children, even if it will make those children healthier.\u00a0 The Trump Administration has made it clear \u2013 short-term profit is much more important.<\/p>\n
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