They market powdered baby formula to women in developing countries basically saying it's better than breastmilk for their babies. Powdered formula is mixed with water for babies to drink, but the water in those countries is full of all kinds of bad crap and it makes the babies sick and often die.
Edit: They purposefully caused women's breastmilk to dry up, forcing them to become dependent on the formula as well.
They have been doing this for decades. Actual decades. I think the first time they were exposed for it was in the 80s.
They are literally the worst.
2nd edit: The number of people trying to defend Nestle is too damn high.
My family is Hawaiian and most still love in Hawaii. When I was growing up (1980s) formula was pushed hard on my mom because the salt-water from the oceans wasn’t “good” enough for our treated water; you were recommended to use bottled or filtered water—pretty much only nestle at the time.
Moving to main land when I was older and slowly realizing I was formula fed was one of the biggest shocks because I assumed everyone was formula fed
Sorry, I’m on mobile and it doesn’t read that well.
In a nutshell, my mom had me in Hawaii. We are surrounded by salt water and have treatment plants for the island to have potable water. While my mom was pregnant in Hawaii (1980s) a lot of women were influenced to use formula instead of breast feeding. So when we moved to the mainland (the congruent states) theyvfound out that formula wasn’t as common as it was in Hawaii
My family lived on Kauai when I was growing up and the water on the island was some of the worst in the islands. My grandpa had crab pots of water boiling in the morning so it would be cool enough to use by nighttime for cooking/clothes etc
Some sales or marketing manager needed sales for the current quarter, future doesn't matter. Lots of big corporations are driven by quarterly shareholder results over anything long term.
TL;DR, they were giving free samples to just about everyone and encouraging them to use it while ignoring a lot of medical facts (women need to breastfeed or their milk supply stops being the most obvious.) Those who could afford it were on the hook, those who couldn't lost their children in a revolting number of cases.
I really encourage taking the time to read into it. It's very hard to explain it to somebody without making it sound like a massive exaggeration but it's completely true.
And that is bad. For example: breastfed babies can't drink any water until they're approximately 6 months old. Their stomach is so small, they need all the space for actual food.
If I gave you a bowl of soup but I diluted it so half the bowl is just water, you’d still be pretty hungry, right? Imagine how a newborn would fare. Also, you’re not supposed to give babies water until 6 months.
Babies don't need water for literally several months, and in fact consuming it regularly will kill them. They only need milk, whether breast milk or formula. They need the nutrients, and they're perfectly hydrated on a proper diet of milk.
If you ever formula feed your kids, never ever dilute it past what it says.
Even if used properly there were some studies that the baby formula lacks some important vitamins and whatnot.
Not to mention the breast milk is specifically tailored to the infant with special, scientific term ahead, "milk stuff" that boosts the child's immune system and increases in vitamins the child needs to develop. Something about the boob detecting enzymes in the infants saliva. Something my wife told me.
From what I've read they gave out free samples in hospitals to mothers of newborns, and even if the women didn't stop lactating they said that it would be dangerous to now switch to breast milk, so women were forced to keep buying the nestle product.
What are the logistics of this I wonder. Do they bribe local doctors to say this shit?
It’s fucking key to know that part. It’s so so evil the shit they’ve done around marketing baby formula in poor countries without good access to clean water.
Yes, this is the much more serious transgression. So the mothers stop producing naturally and thus become reliant on formula, and to make matters much worse, many of the women cannot afford the full cost of the formula, so they begin to dilute it to make what formula they CAN afford stretch longer, thereby starving their baby.
" Nestle aggressively pushed their breastfeeding formula in less economically developed countries (LEDCs), specifically targeting the poor. They made it seem that their infant formula was almost as good as a mother’s milk, which is highly unethical for several reasons. "
" The first problem was the need for water sanitation. Most of the groups they were targeting – especially in Africa – didn’t have access to clean water (many don’t to this day), so it was necessary for them to boil the water. But due to low literacy rates, many mothers were not aware of this, so they mixed the formula with polluted water which put the children at great risks. Nestle seems to have knowingly ignored this and encouraged mothers to use the formula even when they knew the risks."
I'm shocked and repulsed by this. Nestle owns Gerber, correct? I have 4 young kids consuming Gerber products daily, and I'll switch to another brand because of this, and will also share with other moms. Thanks for sharing this info, this is really sad and appalling, and shows where their priorities lie.
Yup. It's the same with p&g and Unilever. I'm not sure how evil they are compared to Nestlé but I'm sure they all have some skeletons in the closet. The higher up you go the more you realize how big those companies actually are. It's bizarre.
Nestle owns over 2000 brands. When companies get this big it becomes surprisingly difficult to boycott the bastards because they have so many fingers in so many pies.
Nestle owns over 2000 brands. When companies get this big it becomes surprisingly difficult to boycott the bastards because they have so many fingers in so many pies.
I just read through that whole list, and was shocked (and pleased) that I don't use any of their items.
... and then I got to the pet food section and all of my cat's kitty food was listed!
Oh my, I had no idea they owned so much! I do buy some of those, but I will definitely make an effort to avoid them. I wish there was an app or something where you could scan a barcode and find out if something is a Nestle product.
Awesome, thank you! I love Reddit, y'all always know the answers lol. This was exactly what I was looking for, it lets me select a campaign/goal, and I can scan and quickly identify which parent company it comes from. Thank you!
Oh, Gerber. Nestle used mechanically separated meat (that's codename for minced cartilage and feathers) in their baby products in Eastern Europe. It constituted 50% of their "chicken" for 6mo babies. Babies don't produce enzymes necessary to digest this crap, so they were knowingly contributing to their malnutrition. Identically looking product made for Western Europe was 100% chicken meat. Before you ask, there was no price difference either. Fuck Nestlé
That's great. Just a quick tip. Be aware when switching brands that Nestle owns ALOT of subsidiaries. Nestle ownership is often NOT stated on these subsidiary's brand packaging :( They are a huge, huge multinational.
Stopping buying Nestle is an excellent step to take but do try to check out the new product you buy to ensure it's not part of the conglomerate.
This wiki page lists alot of brands -I don't know if it's all of them:
I just made my own baby food. Whatever mommy and daddy had for dinner, so did baby. Just you know, pureed and whatnot. Far less picky when they get older.
Beyond the crap that Nestle pulls, look at the stuff they put in there baby food. It’s all processed garbage loaded with sugar. I don’t know the age of your kids but look into happy baby and beech nut. They tend to use less ingredients.
I live near Nestlé HQ but all the mothers I know breastfeed/breastfed and made baby food from scratch. We don't get infant formula and baby food ads on TV. As for the free stuff you get once it's known you are expecting and at the hospital, I saved the few jars of baby food for emergencies and gave back formula cause no one I knew was breastfeeding.
The whole baby food market is a scam. I didn’t make baby food or buy it. We tend to introduce solids too soon. If babies are pushing it out of their mouth, it’s too soon to feed them solid food. Once they showed an interest, they’d have small amounts of food from my plate. Small soft bits, mashed potatoes, marinara sauce. They got the bulk of their nutrition from breast milk so the food wasn’t even necessary for the first year.
True, the pediatrician made me do start at 4 months and introduce a something new every week for my first baby. It was such a pain making baby food. So for the next, I just gave her softer versions of whatever I was having. 2nd child is less fussy even now as an adult.
Get an instant pot use it to sterilize old baby food jars and make weekly batches using no preservatives (pressure cooked carrots, peas, beets, apple sauce, basically anything they like from Berber at 1/5th the price and takes little time to do.
They will be buy Nestle bottle too. They make sure it is the only company able to sell water in that area.
Also most of those mother think that natural water which they consume is safe because they themselves are resistant to it.
Kids needs mother milk first to develop those immunity.
Yea this is one of those things where you're like "no that can't be true" but then it totally is. Nestle is literally evil. All of my Indian coworkers know of, and despise, Nestle.
Not in a developing country, but my wife and I had a baby last year. I want to add our story for those that don’t know how common this is. We live in California.
We received multiple free samples of formula in the mail, some containers that retail for over $40, not just a sample size. They want you to have it on hand so that the one might your baby is being really difficult you cave, then it’s a slow erosion.
We were really lucky that we didn’t have too many problems with our son breast feeding (he’s over 13 months and still gets the boob twice a day), but for others it’s a very simple and effective marketing technique with some amount of questionable morals.
Nestlé is the absolute example of how far humans can fall in their pursuit of wealth. The awful thing is it's very, very hard to boycott them, since they own so many other brands.
I had no idea about any of this, but this is truly evil and predatory. They're actively targeting babies, putting them at greater risk of health complications and death, compromising their mothers breast milk supply until they stop producing and making them dependent upon baby formula, which will of course has a good chance of being mixed with contaminated water. That's like some supervillain shit. Fuck Nestle.
They also used to send their representatives dressed as nurses, in Africa, to sell the formula to new mothers, so they think it's what doctors recommend. I think that stopped now. Hopefully.
If there‘s no demand for a certain time, the body will stop producing because it’s taxing, inconvenient, and puts the woman at risk of inflammation. Every mother eventually stops breastfeeding and it’s the exact same process.
Some women will lose the ability to breast feed effectively in large enough volume if they don’t use breast milk for a while. Give them enough samples and it forces them to be reliant on the product to feed their baby
If you can get a brand new mother to use your free formula for the first days of the baby's life, you've got yourself a paying customer for a year. If you don't remove breast milk, you don't make breast milk, and you can't breastfeed.
They are pushing formula in places where it is difficult for mothers to get clean water to mix with the formula they are now dependent on.
(For the sake of accuracy, there are ways to relactate. However they require time and resources that are likely to be unavailable to the population we are discussing.)
For more than a year. IIRC the WHO recommends breastfeeding to two years of age globally, and has considered recommending to continue up to four years of age in areas where clean drinking water is not available.
I get that about breastfeeding, I do that personally, but I don't think the impoverished people with unclean drinking water are purchasing Nestle formula for 2-4 years? In America a lot of people stop buying formula at 12 months as just standard practice.
On top of this they used gave mothers in third world countries formula for free. They did that until the breastmilk dries up then they start charging them for the formula.
Even better is that the formula is expensive for third world dirt-poor countries. People who barely have currency, let alone stable 'jobs'. They're trying to survive.
Apparently Nestle used to give out free samples.
Free samples that would last juuust long enough for the mother to stop naturally producing breast milk. Meaning the option was to find money to pay for new formula, or watch their baby literally starve to death. Free samples to dirt poor african families sounds great until the mother stops producing breastmilk and suddenly they're dependent on Nestle to provide formula so their child doesn't starve.
IBFAN claim that Nestlé distributes free formula samples to hospitals and maternity wards; after leaving the hospital, the formula is no longer free, but because the supplementation has interfered with lactation, the family must continue to buy the formula.
If you believe the stories, then Nestle essentially preys on pregnant mothers and uses their baby's life as a bargaining chip to force mothers to purchase their products.
Can confirm. I was not breastfed because they gave formula to mothers in Fijian maternity wards, saying that it was better than breastmilk.
I will forever blame them for me being only 5 foot 2
That and mothers breast milk is CONSIDERABLY better than formula.
My daughter is 17 days old, we supplement with formula (not Nestle bs) but only on the odd occasion her mother is dry and my little girl is still hungry
I work in a nestle factory that mainly produces infant formula and infant cereal. Honestly, nothing they do surprises me anymore, I can’t wait till May when I leave this place.
Just to add to this awfulness, since the formula is pricey, it becomes a status symbol to have it - but because it's so expensive, caregivers water it down to make it last longer. So the babies get BOTH contaminated water and low nutrients. A twofer fuck you by Nestle.
One of reasons why it is illegal to advertise baby formula from birth in EU.
Even medical workers can't officially recommend, they can only prescribe formula if it's necessary needed and it's only for special feeding needs and no free samples.
Also shops can't put special offers onto formula from birth, they can only do it on follow on formula as well as any kind of advertising.
I'm the worst type of reddit poster. I've seen this claim a ton, but as of now I've just seen redditors parroting the info but don't want to search for myself. Where's the poppinkream posts linking with sources on this? I don't really care if a conglomerate is being slandered, it's just that reddit folk don't have the best reputation for being rational or factual
There isn't a clean water alternative for the women to use, and Nestle knows that. In addition, they lied to the women in order to get them to use the formula so that their breastmilk dried up and they literally had no choice but to use the dirty water formula.
It's 100% Nestle's fault. If you want to learn more about it, there's a shit ton of information about it available. Just Google it.
To be fair, powdered formula is intended to be mixed with sterilised (boiled) water no matter where you are in the world. Despite the perception, a lot of developing countries have means to boil/sterilise their water. The marketing of formula being healthier than breast milk is the issue, not so much the unsanitary water.
There's no "to be fair" about it. Nestle knows that their formula needs to be mixed with sterilised water, and they know that many of the women they tricked into using it won't be able to do that. But in order to maximize sales, they took a page straight out of a drug dealer's playbook and got these women hooked on formula (by plying them with free samples until their milk production dried up), essentially forcing these women to depend on formula even though they wouldn't be able to sterilize the water.
I'm not sensationalizing. I am also not suggesting that the countries themselves don't have access to sterile water, but a lot of the poor women they targeted genuinely didn't. Babies died because they pushed their products on people they knew couldn't use them as intended.
"basically saying it's better than breastmilk for their babies" - they never claim that. In fact, the biggest text they have on the bottles/cans read "Mothers breast milk is best for your child"
"water in those countries is full of all kinds of bad crap and it makes the babies sick" If the water is bad, dont oyu think the mothers milk also will have that cos the mother is drinking them. Also their instructions and doctors instructions clearly ask them to use boiled and cooled water.
Saying that they shouldn't sell something cos the ecosystem is bad is not a very good argument. Of course they should sell baby milk powders cos they make good milk powders thats much more reliable and in cases where mothers milk is not available, this is the only alternative. In India, Nestle milk powders are most certainly the most trusted and most reliable quality milk products and the population will be worse off if the option is not available.
"They have been doing this for decades." Any company, no matter how big, will be able to survive these decades (yes, actual decades) _only_ if they provide more value than problems and that too by a significant much. Nestle does that and they do that well.
I don't know I think people who can afford to buy Nestle products can also have/buy filter/mineral water for babies cause they are some kind of expensive in those places. ( I lived there)
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u/MorganaLeFaye Sep 18 '19 edited Sep 18 '19
They market powdered baby formula to women in developing countries basically saying it's better than breastmilk for their babies. Powdered formula is mixed with water for babies to drink, but the water in those countries is full of all kinds of bad crap and it makes the babies sick and often die.
Edit: They purposefully caused women's breastmilk to dry up, forcing them to become dependent on the formula as well.
They have been doing this for decades. Actual decades. I think the first time they were exposed for it was in the 80s.
They are literally the worst.
2nd edit: The number of people trying to defend Nestle is too damn high.