EVERY mother's worst nightmare is unfolding in the United States with a baby formula shortage that has deepened during the pandemic and is now a full-blown crisis, leaving parents searching for vital milk and, at times, taking desperate, dangerous measures.
What’s happening?
For mothers who do not breastfeed and depend on baby formula to feed their children, the situation is dire in the United States where children are being hospitalised as a result of parents trying home-made makeshift formulas or using any product they can find, leaving some infants who need specific formulas to have reactions against new ones, while other parents are trying to limit the amount of formula they use.
Why is there a shortage?
From the early days of the pandemic, baby formula was hit by supply chain issues in the same way as many other common products, with ships stuck at ports and warehouses not able to move products due to staff and truck driver shortages, as well as panic-buying and issues that ultimately led to poorly-stocked and sometimes empty shelves in stores worldwide.
It hasn’t improved?
The closure of a manufacturing plant for Abbott Laboratories - the biggest US supplier of powder infant formula - in Michigan in February has seen the situation deteriorate. The factory shut after it recalled infant formula products after four babies who took them developed infections. The firm said there was no link between its formula and the infections but investigations began.
Now?
Some US states are being hit harder than others, including Iowa, Texas and Tennessee, where more than 50 per cent of the best-selling formulas are out of stock in a situation that is impacting lower income families harder - more than half of formula in the US is bought under the Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants, and Children (WIC) government assistance programme.
Desperate measures?
Parents in crisis-mode are searching the web and online forums for homemade formula recipes and although Facebook, TikTok and YouTube have posted warnings over the harms of such content, some babies are being admitted to hospital across the country. Melissa Ryan, chief executive officer of Card Strategies, a consulting firm that researches disinformation online, said: “Misinformation about the shortage is also everywhere. Everything from fake homemade formula recipes to conspiracies about what caused the shortage.”
What is the impact?
Dr. Mark Corkin , of Le Bonheur Children’s Hospital in Memphis, Tennessee, told CBS he was treating babies for reactions suffered from drinking formula different from the ones they usually take. He said: “I've never seen anything like this. They come in dehydrated. We give them IV fluids. We give them nutrition by vein. But that's not a long term solution.”
And what's being done?
President Joe Biden has taken - what many say is late - action, launching 'Operation Fly Formula', that will see mercy flights loaded with 31 tons of formula from Germany into the States, before being distributed nationwide. Meanwhile, the Michigan plant is due to reopen in the next two weeks.
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