Last year in New York City it was Breastmilk Cheese.
This year, London has stepped up it's game and is selling (drum roll please) Breastmilk ICE CREAM! It's a steep price - $22 a pop. (Update since I started writing this - apparently it's been pulled from the market for "health reasons" - unsurprising. thanks AP wire for that brilliant piece of anti-breastfeeding reporting. would you care to specify which type of hepatitis can be transmitted? cuz for Hep B and C breastfeeding IS NOT contraindicated. You could mention the immunological benefits of bf in general, instead of pandering to panic). The BBC had a video about it - the owner was actually quite cute, and seems to have a really great view on breastfeeding. Despite, you know, future trying to freak people out by having a Lady Gaga impersonator sell breastmilk ice cream.
The restaurant is paying moms for their pumped breastmilk. About $24 for 10 oz (which, any pumping mom will know, is a LOT of milk and time). Is it a fair price to be paying? I honestly have never breastfed, nor pumped, so I don't know if I can make that judgment, but I'll get to the concept of paying mothers for pumped milk in a second.
Robert Sietsema from the Village Voice posted this "rant" on the blog. I feel like he sums up just about everything that I've been feeling (except - sir, while there may be something "fundamentally disgusting" about human cheese, you realize, right, that that point can be easily read as there being something “fundamentally disgusting” about breastfeeding).
Breastmilk Ice Cream brings up a number of interesting questions breastfeeding, and about the ethics of sharing breastmilk. Don't get me wrong - I am ALL for milk sharing- formal and informal. Between moms and babies, that is. There are plenty of moms that have abundant milk supplies, or are super efficient at pumping - but as both articles point out - might there not be a better use of this milk? And how else could TEN OUNCES of liquid gold be used that would actually help premies/adopted babies/sick babies/etc etc? And what else are those bambinos eating?
And can we talk about class issues here, for a second? Who would ACTUALLY be able to pay $22 bucks for ice cream?! Yes - breastmilk is EXTREMELY valuable. But what rich set are you actually reaching out to? (would the women who donated be able to afford their own ice cream? doubtful).
On the other side of class and socio-economic issues, to give you a reference point, breastmilk from human milk banks - which process and store donated breastmilk for use with premies, sick kids, etc costs about $5 PER OUNCE. Which, while it is a FANTASTIC thing to have, makes it prohibitive for many people that could or would want to use it.
One of the reasons that Informal milk sharing boards, such as EatsonFeets, have sprung up is because the cost of purchasing milk from milk banks is so high. (Side note: the requirements for donating expressed(pumped) breastmilk are also extremely stringent, which probably both adds to the cost and the appeal of informal milk sharing). I have nothing against Human Milk Banks, they truly are fantastic, and with the costs of sterilizing and shipping milk, as well as the administrative costs that go into it, the price makes sense. However, I think there are a number of women and families that, were milk banks less costly, would use them, rather than switch to formula. (also - Milk Banks around the US are low on supply - which is worrisome – but on a positive note – new ones are opening in Utah and Mississippi! YAY!)
Lets face it, despite what the government and medical groups may feel, women have been sharing milk for centuries, I've known friends that, quite recently, have been breastfeeding at the same time, and one breastfed the other's infant while mom was in the hospital. I would, without a doubt, do the same - as much as that may gross some folks out (but we all know how icky lactating breasts are... please note the dripping sarcasm (get it milk…leaky boob…dripping....anyone, anyone? I spend way too much time in the world of breastfeeding).
But, paying mothers for their pumped milk is an interesting concept. It brings us - in a way - full circle to wet nurses and the hierarchy of infant feeding that led us to the formula feeding culture that we now have. Does anyone know where it will lead us?
A brief run-down of how we got to where we are - for centuries, breastfeeding has been something that if women are wealthy/powerful enough NOT to do, will be passed onto someone else who can. Example A: wet nurses. These women were basically employed to feed their employers children - either at the same time as, or instead of, their own. Breastfeeding, or rather, being able to get someone else to feed your child, has for years been a status symbol. To be fair - there are nuisances to the roll of wet nurses - mainly with maternal deaths and the small, small percentage of women unable to lactate. But for that argument -see milk sharing, above.
Since the second half of the last century, we've been introduced to this little thing called infant formula (Example B) that has taken over the role of wet nurses. And our culture has shifted - in a number of ways - from a society where breastfeeding is the norm, to one where every single statement made about infant feeding is so unbelievably loaded with value and guilt - on BOTH sides. Breastfeeding women being told to cover up if they feed in public or move to the bathroom, or made to feel that they’re messing their child up by breastfeeding for too long; formula-feeding women feel that they're negatively judged for giving their infants formula. I mean - for something as happy and amazing as babies - there's a WHOLE lot of hurting going on.
Anyway this is way off topic...back to Ice Cream and women being paid for pumping. This is such a bizarre situation that I'm having trouble wrapping my head around it. Compensating the women for the milk that went in to making ice cream is the only thing that makes sense. Particularly if you're going to charge $22 for it. (Side note: I'd be really interested to see how much breastmilk goes into each amount of ice cream to make it financially beneficial for the restaurant.) But it's such a weird situation.
I think there are a few things that make this point so difficult to wrap my head around. 1) A good quality pump is expensive. Prohibitively so for a lot of the women I work with. And a bad pump not only works poorly, but can seriously hurt. 2) pumping, as far as I can tell, sucks. Particularly pumping at work, it takes a ton of effort to clean the pumps, store, etc. and it’s not particularly comfortable. 3) Few women, despite new federal laws, are given the ability to pump at work, and if they are, it takes a whole lot of fighting to get there. Even fewer are able to bring their children to work with them. 4) WE DON’T HAVE PAID MATERNITY LEAVE (and for those lucky few that are able to get paid leave- hold on to it tight before your company takes it away!). So most women end up having to go back to work for financial reasons before, or right after their 6 weeks from Family Medical Leave Act are up. Don’t even get me started.
Here's where Sietsema articulates so well the point that was bothering me:
5. Women are not farm animals. Human-breast-milk cheese casts them in that role. There is nothing "ethical" about milking humans. What woman would consent to being milked for the culinary pleasure of others, unless strapped for cash? The natural result of this happening on a large scale is the exploitation of poor mothers, who will be tempted to sell milk and feed their babies formula.
In P!nk's recent music video for her song "Raise your Glass" there's one image of women, blindfolded and strapped to chairs, hooked up to breast pumps. A calf nearby is being fed a bottle of what we can assume is human breast milk. (see minute 1:13-1:30 or so). There's "Dairy Farm" spray painted in the background. Frankly, who knows what P!nk is trying to say. It could be any number of things: 1) she's 8 months preg, pregnant women tend to think about motherhood and feeding their infants. 2 )I hear from new moms all the time that they "feel like a cow" from nursing their babies so often 3) it's a brilliant critique on factory farming 4) she wasn't actually trying to make a point, or had no choice on what the music video designer wanted to include. But it's creepy none the less.
But, as Sietsema points out, paying for breast milk makes me think that we're entering into some creepy, dystopian, "A Handmaid's Tale"-esque future where lower income women will be paid to pump breastmilk for those rich moms that have no interest in doing it themselves. (Atwood didn't even see it coming. ps. favorite book ever). Because of our economic climate, the increasing inability to find a job without a college education, and as the medical professions continues to extol the virtues of breastfeeding, will there some day be a black market for fresh breastmilk? A nouveau wet-nurse for the 21st century? A new way to subjugate women?
On the other hand (to focus on the positives, as my Social Work friends have been training me to do) - what if we actually put a value on breastfeeding, or found some way to compensate women for it? Like, I don't know, PAID MATERNITY LEAVE (1 of 3 countries that don't, folks. It's absurd. check out the pretty infographics, and be slightly less depressed.). What if - instead of counting formula in our industry numbers, we found some way to count breastfeeding in our GNP? You know, to show women that we actually value what they do in nurturing their children? What if we truly valued those first few weeks, and put a price on the immeasurable benefit that comes from breastfeeding - oh wait - we've already done that. Melissa Bartick and Arnold Reinhold did put a price on it. They argue that we spend an average of $13 billion...yes...BILLION in excess medical costs because of what they term "suboptimal" breastfeeding (ie less than 6 months exclusive breastfeeding). Check out their article "The Burden of Suboptimal Breastfeeding in the United States: A Pediatric Cost Analysis. They also argue that there's 911 preventable deaths as well.
To leave you with my favorite of Sietsema's points: "Breast-milk cheese forces babies to compete with hipster foodies for mother's milk, and a baby can't punch a foodie in the face." Amen.
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