New Likud bill to guilt-trip women into breastfeeding

Dimi Reider By Dimi Reider July 12, 2011 | Edit

It could be the stars, but today is particularly thick on mind-blowing items: After the passing of the boycott law and the announcement the parliamentary “inquiries” into the already-transparent funding of leftist NGOs will be put into action by next week, now comes a bill allowing the state to intervene in breastfeeding.

Yep, you read it correctly: A bill sponsored by Beck’s chaperon MK Danny Danon (Likud) would have it that any woman who doesn’t want to breastfeed her child would sign a form, stating that she was explained the medical benefist of breastfeeding and is still willing to expose her baby to disease. The Breastfeeding Encouragement Bill (Hebrew) states:

“A hospital shall not feed a newborn with a food compound for babies unless the mother has allowed this by signing a form to be determined by the minister. Said form shall include information to encourage breastfeeding, including information on the benefits of breastfeeding, information on the diseases and phenomena made less likely by breastfeeding, and other relevant information to be determined by the minister.”

Now, it’s true that there are many issues with milk substitutes and how they are chosen and used in Israeli hospitals (for example, Ynet reported in 2008 that hospitals choose their brand of milk substitute simply by the amount of gifts and benefits showered on them by the manufacturers). And there’s surely nothing wrong with providing information on the various options to feed a baby (although I assume such information is provided in the run-up to the actual birth). But to assail a woman in the afterbirth daze with a list of horrors that will consume her baby unless she breastfeeds? What business does the state even have in intervening in such a personal decision at such a crucial time? The mind boggles.

Dimi Reider

Dimi (Dmitry) Reider is an Israeli journalist.  His work has appeared in The New York Review of Books,  The New York Times,The Guardian, Foreign Policy, Haaretz,  Jerusalem Post, and  Index on Censorship. "Dimi's Notes" has been quoted and referenced by the following publications:

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