When you go to the pediatrician or the nurse to do a check-up, or because the child is sick, you should go through the consultation door and find the professional surrounded by the medical consultation instruments, books and papers and a children's poster so that the children entertain themselves a little and do not see the consultation as the white tunnel of terror.
More or less that is what it should be, and now I will tell you what it shouldn't be, and yet there are many. There should be no artificial milk samples in sight of anyone and there shouldn't be no poster showing any brand of those who manufacture artificial milk. And I would say that this is rarely accomplished.
Some time ago I talked about it and asked a similar question. The years have passed and I have the impression that the thing has not improved much and that is why I ask you: Are there artificial milk samples in your pediatrician or nurse's office?
Having samples makes no sense
It is likely that many think "And what is the problem if they have milk samples?" and I understand, because there are both babies who drink breast milk and babies who drink artificial milk, and as respectable is the decision of a mother to decide to breastfeed as that of another who decides not to. Well, the problem is that doctors and nurses are health agents and therefore they are dedicated to the promotion and prevention of health and to help mothers and children to restore it when for some reason the disease arrives.
AdvertisingAs health agents, their role is to advise and help parents to achieve that your children have the highest level of health possible, through the most recommended behaviors and customs. That's why they talk about feeding and try to explain what a balanced diet is like, that's why they talk about how important it is for children to exercise and that's why they explain that the best thing for a baby is to drink breast milk, rather than artificial milk.
If a mother decides that her child will not play sports, or if she prefers to give pre-cooked food instead of food prepared at home, it is already something that escapes and must escape the function of the toilets. Its task is to offer the information and then each mother and father make the decisions they consider best.
Well, at the feeding level for the baby, pediatricians and nurses should always offer valid information about breastfeeding and artificial milk and help mothers who want to breastfeed so that they can do it in case of having problems, giving the support so they can do it for a long time (at least six months of exclusive breastfeeding recommended and up to two years accompanied by other foods).
It makes no sense, none, that a pediatrician or a nurse is helping and supporting a mother to breastfeed and then have a consultation full of milk ads and even samples of artificial milk. It makes no sense because it contradicts the advice he is giving.
In addition, without the advice, having milk samples gives value to the brand you see. People relate white-coat people to health, and everything they can offer you will be related to achieving better health. If I go to the pediatrician and see that he has milk samples Chuchimilk 1 it is more likely that if I decide to use it one day I will buy that brand than no other I don't know. Even, knowing the brand, you are more likely to buy food from it and not others: "Look, the Chuchigalletas. They are of the same brand as the pediatrician's milk samples in the office. Surely they are good."
It makes no sense and also and illegal
Perhaps you will say that you still don't think so much. I still think so, that it is for so much, because I cannot go to a doctor to tell me that I have to do sports when he weighs more than 100 kg and is sedentary, I cannot hear him if he tells me to stop drinking alcohol if I meet him in the bars and I can't hear him if he tells me to quit tobacco if I see him outside the ambulatory smoking a cigar in a break. Therefore, pediatricians and nurses must promote breastfeeding over artificial breastfeeding and therefore they cannot and should not have artificial milk samples.
That said, continuous, and that is not a moral issue, only, but also, and above all, legal. It is not legal to have samples of artificial milk in the consultation or posters or calendars in which the brands of the manufacturers are seen.
In Spain we have REAL DECREE 867/2008, which prohibits advertising the so-called "infant formula", which is the starter milk (or type 1). It is also prohibited for manufacturers or distributors of artificial milk to reach the general public, whether pregnant women, mothers or relatives, products indirectly through the health services or health personnel, that is, neither pediatricians nor nurses should give samples of artificial milk to nobody.
And it is also not allowed to have posters or calendars in the consultation in which the manufacturer's brand can be seen, since they are advertising their products, through the brand. Now many manufacturers design posters and material in which the brand is barely visible, but with a typography or style that makes mothers know immediately the brand that is advertised without reading the name. It also doesn't work, of course. It is still illegal.
So as it is illegal, both nurses and pediatricians should choose not to take samples or anything intended to advertise directly or indirectly. But of course, for this to happen professionals They should know that this is illegal, and many do not know. The first time I explained in the center where I work that was illegal, my fellow nurses made a surprise face. They did not know. The same face that the pharmacist put on the day I told her that making sales and offers with artificial milk type 1 is illegal.
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