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This picture was shown in a recent lecture of mine. Both these babies are (I think) a few months old. The indian woman in the picture was told that she could not provide enough milk for both babies (twins) and so that one would have to be bottle fed. Sadly, it is thought that due to the price of formula, the woman was unable to afford to feed one properly and watered down the mixture; hence depriving her baby of essential nutrients for growth. The other she chose to breast feed continuously. The smaller one on the right died 3 days after this picture was taken.
Let this help you to appreciate a number of things:
1. The importance of mother's to their babies. If they are taken away from them, think about how much it would change their lives.
2. We are lucky to live in such a wealthy country where something like this is a highly unlikely if not impossible occurance.
3. BREAST IS BEST! Breast feed your children!
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2 comments:
This just makes me so sad. I hear of this way too often.
I believe this picture was taken by Sarah Blaffer Hrdy in 1989. It was in her book Mother Nature and the story is a little bit different. The mother not only chose to breastfeed the boy but gave the girl to relatives to care for. This was the first time she saw her in 5 months. The relatives were unable to feed her adequately, that is true. However, this is not so much a case of the mother not being able to provide for both, but rather of selective neglect of a female infant due to the societal preference for males. The message should be more about advocating against male preference and female infanticide than anything else.
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