A Familiar Formula

The infant formula industry's massive PR campaign against breastfeeding has striking parallels to the assault on natural immunity from COVID.

My parents were 19 and 21 when they got married. They did not come from money. Dad was a high school dropout and Mom’s higher education consisted of a year of secretarial school.

When my sister and I were born, my parents shared a single clunker of a car and lived with my aunt and uncle. Mom made her own clothes and cut our hair (and not because she was especially gifted with a pair of scissors — I have photos of a young Jenna with Jim Carrey bangs to prove it).

I was nearly 30 when I got married and 33 when I had my first daughter. While struggling to nurse her one day, I asked my mom if she’d ever had any issues breastfeeding.

“I didn’t breastfeed you,” she laughed. “You only did that if you couldn’t afford formula.”

I guess it must have escaped her notice that she couldn’t afford formula.

Infant formula was originally created as a life-saving option for women who were unable to nurse. Soon, though, the infant formula industry launched a massive PR campaign to portray breastfeeding as a poor mom’s sport and pushed their lucrative imitation alternatives instead.

The campaign was wildly successful, knocking nursing levels down to around 20% in the 1950s and 1960s. Thankfully, biology’s (second?) most natural act began to regain popularity in the late 1970s; today, more than 80% of U.S. moms nurse their newborns.

The fact that anyone, anywhere, could be convinced that a processed chemical cocktail that may or may not contain artificial sweeteners, emulsifiers, stabilizers, BPA, and GMO corn and soy was superior to the convenient, portable, biologically perfect feeding system Mother Nature brilliantly built into the female body is mind-blowing if you ask me. Sure, if a woman has a condition that prevents her from being able to suckle her spawn or has some reason she needs to be separated from her baby for long stretches or, heaven forbid, dies during childbirth, I’m glad there are alternatives to ground up dinosaur nuggets. (It’s worth noting that some formulas are far superior to others, so if you’re in the market for a breastmilk substitute, for the love of lactose, please do your research.) But calling any synthetic stand-in ‘better than breastmilk’ and framing lactating as shameful is a dangerous and deplorable money grab by manufacturers that has been supported by policymakers and lobbyists for decades.

The parallels to natural immunity from infection are so clear. Oh, you had COVID? That’s nice. We still want you to take this experimental gene therapy that lists death (among hundreds of other debilitating ills) as a side effect. No, it won’t prevent you from getting sick or spreading the virus to others, but you’re a selfish granny-killer if you refuse it, insists Pfizer CEO Albert Bourla, who personally raked in more than $24 million in the first year of his company’s COVID vaccine rollout. (Also, Bourla did not technically say that; that was rhetorical hyperbole on my part, a literary device still protected by freedom of speech.)

I have a degree in advertising and a background in marketing, and I grudgingly give the CDC, the FDA, and the Biden administration props for a frighteningly successful vaccine campaign. You don’t get more than half the country to chirp ‘safe and effective’ about an experimental injectable that has proven to be neither without some serious spin from a relentlessly powerful propaganda machine.

Fortunately, truths are trickling out. Whistleblowers are stepping out of the shadows and doctors are speaking out about deadly COVID “treatment” protocols and the alarming numbers of vaccine injuries and deaths. The most mainstream of media are even reporting that repeated jabs can, in fact, weaken your immune system — something the spoiler alertists have been saying all along.

A widely-ignored-by-MSM Israeli study found that “the risk of developing symptomatic COVID was 27 times higher among the vaccinated, and the risk of hospitalization eight times greater [than in those with acquired immunity].” Instead of spreading this hopeful, helpful news, the media collectively decided that “You’re not a horse” was a far better boost for ratings.

I feel grateful that with a little patience and some help from a lactation consultant, I was able to nurse my babies. Similarly, I’m thankful that I caught and recovered from COVID and not only have all that robust natural protection but an intact immune system to boot.

As hard as they try — and damn, do they try; Pfizer and J&J spent more than $50 million on COVID advertising in the first six months of 2021 alone — the pharmedia (my word) and their favorite philanthropaths (not my word) will never scare me into begging for something I don’t need that could injure or kill me.

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Jenna McCarthy is a speaker and the author of a few dozen books for adults and children. Her writing will appear here regularly, in a new column called “Here’s a thought…” Subscribe now to get the series in your inbox, along with the rest of the FLCCC’s news and updates.