Florida mothers send breast milk overseas to help keep babies HIV-free
By Tim Collie
South Florida Sun-Sentinel
After finally accepting that her son had a protein allergy that kept him from taking her breast milk, Ruth Weinberger faced another issue: What to do with the three months’ supply in her freezer?
She knew that the vitamins and nutrients in breast milk boost a baby’s immune system. So the Broward County mother began searching for a place to donate it.
In Europe and her native South Africa, human milk is banked to feed orphans and premature babies whose mothers may either be too sick or cannot produce milk to feed them. But clinics in South Florida wouldn’t accept it.
“I was sad that he couldn’t take it, but I would have been sadder if no one could take it,” said Weinberger, 41, of Fort Lauderdale.
After weeks of online research, Weinberger found a pioneering group that ships the milk of American mothers to feed babies in Africa and reduce the risk of HIV infection in newborns.
The International Breast Milk Project, the brainchild of a Minnesota mom, has shipped roughly 10,000 ounces of milk to South Africa in the past year. It feeds infants whose mothers have HIV, which can be transmitted through breast milk, and those who live in areas where water is too dirty to mix with powdered formula.Weinberger, who estimates she shipped about 1,000 ounces, is among about 100 mothers across the United States who have contributed. Another 500 have asked about donating. One Tampa mother has produced 1,000 ounces and continues stockpiling 10 ounces every day after feeding her daughter.
http://www.sun-sentinel.com/news/nationworld/sfl-abreastmilk12xmar12,0,4030349.story