A few weeks ago there began to be a shortage of formula in the US, a situation that has reached what some officials have called a ‘crisis situation’.
Baby formula is in dramatically short supply, with many stores locking up the formula, limiting it to one per customer, or the stock in the stores simply not there. Parents of babies who need formula are having to drive far distances, pay exorbitant online prices to opportunist sellers – or do without.
As a mother of 11 who has been deeply committed to breastfeeding, I nonetheless have experienced the challenge of not being able to nurse two of my babies. I nursed my tenth child, who had a weak sucking reflex, for four months, while simultaneously pumping for several hours a day to keep my supply up. I finally gave up when despite all my efforts, I couldn’t produce the milk he needed. (I later realized that the two pumps I had borrowed were faulty and that was the source of the problem, but in my exhausted state and with very limited community resources, I couldn’t access other options.)
I turned to formula, trying different kinds while also looking for goats’ milk and mothers’ milk donors, for the most part without success. Finally, after five months we found a formula he could tolerate, that was only available by medical prescription and cost over 1000 shekels a month.
When my eleventh child came into our lives via the legal system, I began seeking out mothers’ milk donors before he even arrived home. I was then living in the center of the country, and access to community resources was dramatically different. Like his brother before him, he couldn’t tolerate regular formula. For the first two years, we were blessed to be able to give him mother’s milk for all but two months (a week here, a week there, when the donor milk couldn’t be found), and for those in-between times we supplemented with a medical prescription formula. I later donated the many unused cans we had purchased to a mother in financial need whose child used that specialty formula. I was so grateful to have the resources that I needed to keep him healthy.
When I think of these desperate mothers seeking food for their babies, it’s heartbreaking. I once ran out of formula due to logistics in prescription/purchasing rules (those have since changed) and we ended up in the emergency room on Shabbos as a result.
These mothers need options. While breastfeeding is wonderful and I fully support it, it’s not an option for everyone. It’s disturbing for me to see commentators – especially men – suggesting that if mothers would be breastfeeding they wouldn’t be in this situation.
Many women physically can’t produce milk no matter how much they try, due to illness or physical challenge on the side of the mother or baby; there are foster/adoptive parents/grandparents raising children that they didn’t give birth to.
I do believe that steps will be taken to to increase formula production and hopefully this will be a short-lived crisis. In the interim, parents need help. If you are a nursing mother and know someone struggling with the formula shortage, perhaps you can offer to help out by pumping. I can’t tell you how grateful I am to the tens of mothers who kept our youngest nourished and healthy thanks to their donations. Or if you see formula in your stores, buy it to donate to someone else who can’t find it. Or share the below information for how to make their own.
How did people feed their infants in the days before commercially produced formula was available? Hiring a wet nurse was a common practice, but in cultures that didn’t have that practice, parents made their own. Here’s are two recipes for formula that are nutritionally complete that were published in Nourishing Traditions; one is dairy and one is meat based. Goat milk is an excellent replacement for mother’s milk, though it needs to be supplemented with vitamin B12 and folate. Many of our elders who were bottle-fed were raised on evaporated milk mixed with Karo syrup; here is a simple emergency formula replacement recipe using evaporated milk, as well as an excellent explanation for why evaporated milk is a better option than regular milk. **Disclaimer: of course every parent needs to verify with their medical professionals that the option they are considering is appropriate for their child.**
Hopefully this situation will quickly be resolved. In the meantime, parents can look to alternative solutions and feel empowered knowing they have the tools to keep their babies fed and happy.
Avivah
I’m a long time reader who is very much not of the same mind as you when it comes to alternative medicine, natural remedies, and public health. Which is totally fine, eilu v’eilu and I enjoy your blog for its other content. But most mainstream doctors are advising that homemade formula is dangerous and can kill infants. It can be easily contaminated, cause electrolyte imbalances that damage liver, kidney, and brain function, and be nutritionally incomplete, no matter how much the recipe may claim otherwise. There are already stories in the US news of babies ending up in the hospital from similar attempts. It is a big achrayus to take on yourself to promote these recipes. Did you ask a shaila?
Also, in the days of our elders, 1 in 10 babies died before age 1, so these fond memories of wet nurses and natural homemade remedies for things are maybe a bit optimistic.
I am sure my comment won’t be well-received but if it stops even one lurking reader from trying this potentially dangerous solution or makes them at least pause and think twice, it will have been worth it to send in.
Hi, Mimi, thank you for your comment! I have readers who are here for a variety of reasons, and I would assume that a good percentage of them don’t agree with every single thing I do nor are they interested in everything that I share about. As a long time reader, you have seen that I don’t censor comments nor am I disturbed by respectful disagreement.
Formula is created by those who are professionals and have analyzed the nutritional needs of infants. The recipes I shared have similarly been created; they aren’t randomly thrown together. Many doctors take one position, and in every situation there are many doctors who have a different position.
It’s fine to disagree with my suggestion, but please provide an alternate solution that you find preferable or advisable. What do you suggest as a solution for the absence of formula? Do you understand that I’m addressing a crisis situation in which parents simply cannot find any formula to buy? Do you realize the option for that is to give a baby nothing and literally let him starve? I’m not being hyperbolic. As I shared, I’ve been in this desperate situation before and I never, never want to be in that situation again. And I don’t want anyone else to be in that situation.
There has to be an interim solution for parents to use until formula production resumes. I welcome other suggestions; it’s a very good thing to have more people recognizing the situation and looking for ways to help.
In the days of wet nurses, in the absence of being able to hire someone, parents commonly used a sugar and water solution. Yes, many infants died from the lack of nutrition in that mixture, but not from the mother’s milk, which is (assuming the women is healthy and eats a decent diet) nutritionally superior to any formula that has been created to date.
As far as your general statement regarding the optimistic memories of the good old days, there are always things to learn from the past and there are things to improve upon. One day we will look back at some of our current practices and wonder how we did the things we did, with the less positive historical view of the results to society. Just because we accept things now since that’s how they’re done doesn’t mean it’s the best thing or even a good thing.
I don’t agree with doing what everyone does just because that’s what is being done by everyone. One needs to be prayerful and thoughtful about what one does and doesn’t do as much as possible. Sometimes we will err and in hindsight see a different choice would have been better, so along with doing the best we can, we need to have the humility and self-forgiveness that we did the best we could with the information we had at that time.
Thank you for publishing my comment and giving such a thorough and thoughtful response. Many/most local news sites and hospital systems in the US have published lists of formula alternatives, links to formula and breast milk banks and community resources, phone numbers to call, etc. There are many grassroots efforts at formula acquisition and distribution on social media. I would try any and all of these, ordering formula from Canada or Europe, getting samples from the pediatrician, and going to the ER and asking for help there before feeding my baby a dubious homemade concoction from the internet that all doctors are warning is dangerous and could possibly kill them.
I fully understand that we are in a crisis situation. Which actually makes it MORE noteworthy, not more worthy of ignoring, that doctors are still strongly advising people not to use homemade formulas. To me, that says that they truly believe it is really dangerous to do so and are trying to stop desperate parents from making a possibly fatal mistake with their children’s health without trying literally everything else and coming into a hospital for help first. It is a big achrayus to take on to tell people to ignore this expert advice.
I really appreciate your blog and have read and enjoyed it for almost 10 years now without ever commenting. I followed your aliyah story from afar from the early days! But I felt like I had to comment now because this could cause immediate harm. The mainstream medical community is adamant that homemade formula is dangerous, and that Weston A Price recipe and its illegal unpasteurized milk has been specifically called out. Goat’s milk is also dangerous. I just feel like presenting the opinion that it is OK, and promoting recipes, without any counterpoint or note about what actual doctors advise, is a very risky responsibility to take on as a layperson and I’m hoping readers will think twice.
I’ve spent a long time researching alternative formula options and don’t agree with your conclusions about the alternatives I mentioned being dangerous. But I hear your concern.
I’m glad to hear that so many people are jumping in to find solutions. BH!
And I’m also glad to hear that you’ve been reading and enjoying my blog for so long. But you’ve left me wondering what it is you’ve enjoyed…. In all those years, after hundreds of posts, there was never anything positive you wanted to give feedback about? You never felt like you wanted to share any appreciation in response to anything I wrote? I’d love to hear what keeps you coming back since all that I know is what you strongly disagree with!
I’ve very much enjoyed following your aliyah journey and integration, and your journeys with your kids and parenting. And you really know how to write! Which is unfortunately a rarer skill than it ought to be. As a giyores who doesn’t quite fit in all the tight boxes of the Orthodox community, the calm confidence you project about the way you and your family do things and your individuality can be inspiring to those of us who don’t fit the typical mold so well and are more sensitive about it, even if the ways I don’t fit in the box are different than yours.
Thank you for adding the disclaimer. As you can probably tell from the fact that I broke 10 years of committed lurking silence to comment on a post, I am genuinely really concerned about this being dangerous advice. I work in Early Intervention and our program RNs have given us lists of formula resources and emphasized for us to tell concerned families to never, ever either water down formula or try to make their own and that it is really unsafe. Parents can and will make their own independent decisions based on their beliefs but some may not even know to consider that it could be a problem. So thank you for editing the post to add that. I really appreciate it.
Thank you so much for taking time to share your feedback on what interests you, I appreciate it! It’s helpful for me to know who is reading and why. 🙂
Thanks also for the respectful dialogue, that’s very appreciated.