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Breast Milk Contains Stem Cells
Monday, 11 February 2008
By Catherine Madden
Science Network, Western Australia
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The Perth scientist [Dr Mark Cregan] who made the world-first discovery that human
breast milk contains stem cells is confident that within five years
scientists will be harvesting them to research treatment for conditions
as far-reaching as spinal injuries, diabetes and Parkinson’s disease.
He believes that it not only meets all the nutritional needs of a
growing infant but contains key markers that guide his or her
development into adulthood.
“We already know how breast milk provides for the baby’s nutritional
needs, but we are only just beginning to understand that it probably
performs many other functions,” says Dr Cregan, a molecular biologist
at The University of Western Australia.
He says that, in essence, a new mother’s mammary glands take over from
the placenta to provide the development guidance to ensure a baby’s
genetic destiny is fulfilled.
“It is setting the baby up for the perfect development,” he says. “We
already know that babies who are breast fed have an IQ advantage and
that there’s a raft of other health benefits. Researchers also believe
that the protective effects of being breast fed continue well into
adult life.
“The point is that many mothers see milks as identical – formula milk
and breast milk look the same so they must be the same. But we know now
that they are quite different and a lot of the effects of breast milk
versus formula don’t become apparent for decades. Formula companies
have focussed on matching breast milk’s nutritional qualities but
formula can never provide the developmental guidance.”
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Read full article:
http://www.sciencealert.com.au/news/20081102-16879.html
Benefits of Breastfeeding
Reports Link Breastfeeding with Cancer Reduction
Breast and ovarian cancer as well as obesity are reduced through breastfeeding according to a new review study by the World Cancer Research. A special recommendation is given to breastfeeding in the review and International Board Certified Lactation Consultants are referenced. The study is
available at www.dietandcancerreport.org
"If all women who do not breastfeed or who breastfeed for
less than 3 months were to do so for 4 to 12 months, breast cancer among parous
premenopausal women could be reduced by 11 percent, judging from current rates.
If all women with children lactated for 24 months or longer, however, then the
incidence might be reduced by nearly 25 percent. This reduction would be even
greater among women who first lactate at an early age." Newcomb PA, Storer BE, Longnecker
MP, et al. "Lactation and reduced risk of premenopausal breast cancer." N Engl J Med. 1994; 330:81-87
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Women who were
formula-fed as infants have higher rates of breast cancer as adults. For both
premenopausal and postmenopausal breast cancer, women who were breastfed as
children, even if only for a short time, had a 25% lower risk of developing
breast cancer than women who were bottle-fed as infants. Freudenheim, J. et al. 1994 "Exposure to
breast milk in infancy and the risk of breast cancer". Epidemiology
5:324-331
Breastfeeding Reduces Stress
Why Human Milk?In our work with
babies and their mothers we are sometimes faced with the challenge of low milk
production. Due to numerous reasons, allergies being the number one, parents often
seek alternative ways to supplement their infant when supplementation is
necessary. Another reason parents choose to provide only human milk to their baby
is because of the antibodies and other anti-infectious components. Babies in families susceptible to allergies can be sensitized to cow's milk protein with just one bottle (Host,
Husby, Osterballe, 1988; Host, 1991) Early exposure to cow’s milk protein increases the
child’s risk of developing insulin dependent diabetes mellitus (IDDM) in susceptible families (Mayer et al, 1988; Karjalainen, et al, 1992) Banked human
milk is an excellent way of avoiding unnecessary exposure to cow’s milk protein.
Though formula provides the necessary
nutrition for a growing infant, it can not replace the other ingredients in a
baby’s species specific milk. Stephen Buescher, MD (Professor of Pediatrics and
a member of the Division of Pediatric Basic Sciences.) joined Eastern Virginia Medical School in 1992 and since that time he has directed a laboratory focused on human milk-inflammation, its cellular and humoral components, and the anti-inflammatory characteristics. He states that human milk is only 10% nutrition. The remaining 90% supports the health and development of every system in the human body. Although formula does a decent job of replacing the nutritional properties of human milk, it will never be able to provide all of the other essential components (ILCA Plenary Session- Buescher, 2006). Please consider supporting
the Mothers’ Milk Bank of New England with
your donation. This bank will make it possible for many babies in Massachusetts to
continue receiving human milk when their mothers are unable to provide a full
supply of milk.
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Breastfeeding Study
Study touts benefits of breast-feeding
Researchers link the practice to higher child IQ
By Will Dunham, Reuters | May 6, 2008
WASHINGTON - A new study provides some of the best evidence to date
that breast-feeding can make children smarter, an international team
of researchers said yesterday.
Children whose mothers breast-fed them longer and did not mix in baby
formula scored higher on intelligence tests, researchers in Canada and
Belarus reported.
About half the 14,000 babies were randomly assigned to a group in
which prolonged and exclusive breast-feeding by the mother was
encouraged at Belarusian hospitals and clinics. The mothers of the
other babies received no special encouragement.
Those in the breast-feeding encouragement group were, on average,
breast-fed longer than the others and were less likely to have been
given formula in a bottle.
At 3 months, 73 percent of the babies in the breast-feeding group were
breast-fed, compared with 60 percent of the other group. At 6 months,
it was 50 percent versus 36 percent.
In addition, the group given encouragement was far more likely to give
their children only breast milk. The rate was seven times higher, for
example, at 3 months.
The children were monitored for about 6 1/2 years.
The children in the group where breast-feeding was encouraged scored
about 5 percent higher in IQ tests and did better academically,
researchers found.
Previous studies had indicated brain development and intelligence
benefits for breast-fed children.
But researchers have sought to determine whether the benefits were
because the children were breast-fed, or that mothers who prefer to
breast-feed their babies may differ from those who do not.
The design of the study - randomly assigning babies to two groups
regardless of the mothers' characteristics - was intended to eliminate
the confusion.
"Mothers who breast-feed or those who breast-feed longer or most
exclusively are different from the mothers who don't," Dr. Michael
Kramer of McGill University in Montreal and the Montreal Children's
Hospital said in a phone interview.
"They tend to be smarter. They tend to be more invested in their
babies. They tend to interact with them more closely. They may be the
kind of mothers who read to their kids more, who spend more time with
their kids, who play with them more," added Kramer, who led the study
published in the journal Archives of General Psychiatry.
Researchers measured the differences between the two groups using IQ
tests administered by the children's pediatricians and by ratings by
their teachers of their school performance.
Both sets of scores were significantly higher in the children from the
breast-feeding promotion group.
The study was launched in the mid-1990s. Kramer said the initial idea
was to do it in the United States and Canada, but many hospitals in
those countries by that time had begun strongly encouraging breast-
feeding as a matter of routine.
The situation was different in Belarus at the time, he said, with less
routine encouragement for the practice.
Kramer said that how breast-feeding may make children more intelligent
is unclear.
"It could even be that because breast-feeding takes longer, the mother
is interacting more with the baby, talking with the baby, soothing the
baby," he said. "It could be an emotional thing. It could be a
physical thing. Or it could be a hormone or something else in the milk
that's absorbed by the baby."
Previous studies have shown that babies whose mothers breast-fed them
enjoy many health advantages over formula-fed babies.
These include fewer ear, stomach, or intestinal infections, digestive
problems, skin diseases and allergies, and less risk of developing
high blood pressure, diabetes, and obesity.
The American Academy of Pediatrics recommends that women who do not
have health problems exclusively breast-feed their infants for at
least the first six months, and continue to breast-feed at least
through the first year as other foods are introduced.
Study links breast-feeding to higher IQ scores for children - The
Boston Globe
© Copyright 2008 The New York Times Company
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