This is an important compilation of excerpts of the testaments given at the Senator Edward Kennedy Hearing. The Hearing helped prompt the eventual adoption of the International Code in 1981. (see also Blog on John Bolton)
Natividad Clavano,MD, giving evidence from the her hospital in Manila, the Philippines. She explains how they reversed their infant mortality rates (IMR) by keeping mothers and babies together and raising breastfeeding rates to 81%. The IMR in her hospital in Manila reduced to 25.5% compared to the overall IMR of the Philippines of 74%.
Oswaldo Ballarin, President of Nestlé Brazil (left) answering Senator Edward Kennedy (right) about Nestlé’s responsibility for the use of breastmilk substitutes in areas of poverty. Ballarin says that Nestlé can’t have that responsibility and that he has been advised by Nestlé that this is an indirect attack on the free world system.
President of Nestlé Brazil, Oswaldo Ballarin:
“The United States Nestlé Company has advised me that this is an indirect attack on the free world’s economic system. A worldwide church organization with the stated purpose of undermining the free enterprise system is at the front of this activity
Kennedy: “Now you can’t seriously expect – laughter – we’ll be in order now please, we’ll be in order. Today we will focus on one small element of the problems. We’ll focus on the use of a product intended to nourish life and to enable infants to thrive and grow, to see how it can have the unintended effects of fostering malnutrition and spreading disease. We will focus on the advertising, marketing and promotion and the use of infant formula in developing nations. Can a product which requires clean water, good sanitation, adequate family income and a literate parent to follow printed instructions, be properly and safely used in areas where water is contaminated, sewage runs in the streets, poverty is severe and illiteracy is high? “
