The following article is PAGASA's position on Executive Order 51
(Breastmilk Supplements and Related Products).
1. Given today's busy lifestyle for urbanites, working mothers must
given a choice on how to feed her infant when she cannot, because of
work schedules or career requirements (i.e., assigned to a post
out-of-town or out of the country), breastfeed her child. These
modern-day heroes shuffling as mothers and professionals should be
provided access to breastmilk substitutes to assure that the delicate
balance of providing the needed nourishment to their child and getting
their work done is achieved. One may say that these young mothers will
have to make a choice to stay at home as mothers or stay childless to
advance their careers. This seems to sound fine but will surely not hold
water for today's young (especially urbanite) female adults who want to
shuffle between work and motherhood. This sounds like work/sexual
discrimination at the workplace. After all, we need all the output
these productive young women can contribute to our economy.
To address this predicament and increase the collective productive
output of these young female adults who want to balance life as mothers
and career women, we must make breastmilk substitutes available to them
at prices they can afford.
2. It may be advisable for these careered young mothers to attain a
6-month permit from their O.B.Gyne/Pediatrician which states that within
that period of time, she is allowed to purchase breastmilk substitutes
for the sustainance of her infant. This way, she need not line up at a
pediatrician's office each time she needs to buy breastmilk substitutes
and pay for the said prescription. The latter not only takes precious
time off her limited conscious hours
in a day but saves her some money in having to pay for the needed
prescription from the pediatrician.
3. In order to make breastmilk substitutes affordable to careered
lactating mothers (as some of them are wage earners), these must be
relatively well-distributed. To achieve economies of scale for both the
manufacturers and distributors, it would be wise to allow for a wider
range of channels of distribution and include supermarkets as outlets
for these products. This not only makes the product more affordable to
the young mother, it also makes it more accessible to her. Supermarkets
must of course, ask for the permit (which lasts for 6 months) before
allowing the purchase of infant (0-6 months old) milk. For mothers with
children 6-months to 2-years old, we suggest they get another permit
from their pediatrician (stating that they are
working with so-and-so company and have children who were born so-and-so
dates thereby needing from time to time to buy milk until the
child/children are 2 years of age) which expires every 6 months for the
same purpose and for the same line of reasoning. As such, working
mothers who are contractual in nature will have to continuously
breastfeed their child/children while employed to assure that they are
still producing milk for them when she no longer works (as these mothers
will not be given a 6-month permit by their pediatricians now that
they are non-working mothers).
4. Regarding the safeguarding of breastmilk substitutes from false
advertising and fraudulent misrepresentation, we suggest that we need
not totally ban all advertisements for these products as that will also
affect an industry (that of advertising and its allied industries) and
our fragile economy as a whole. What we need is vigilant and
consistent screening of ads before they are released to the public.
Here, hefty sanctions for violations should
be added to the Bill to protect the public from constant "brain-washing"
and "mis-orientation" from unscrupulous manufacturers / marketing
people / advertisers / p.r. practitioners who offer their breastmilk
substitutes as infant formula promoting/enhancing giftedness or
intellectual superiority.
STEVEN T. CUA
President
PAGASA
Phil. Amalgamated Supermarkets Assn