Re: [pronut-hiv] Best corn /soya blend for non-breast fed infants over 6 months (2)

["Nkuoh Godlove" <nnkuoh@yahoo.com>]

Thanks Ted for the explanation. Thanks for giving a better meaning to my message and thus helps our readers. I agree that our mixture can not  adquately replace breast milk I only shared one of the areas and  experiences. The types of food may be purely in Cameroon since i may not be familiar with what is obtained in other areas. Of course there are lots of challenges which we are facing.
Nkuoh Godlove

----- Ted Greiner <tedgreiner@yahoo.com> wrote: 

Below Nkuoh Godlove writes about one of the key challenges in the infant feeding component of PMTCT programs, how to adequately feed the non-breastfed infant. Until this can be solved, early cessation of breastfeeding cannot be an effective strategy to increase HIV-free survival rates.
   
  I am not familiar with the food he refers to and how it is used and he may not have meant to imply that these are the only foods given. He does not say if it is fortified with a wide range of nutrients, as the CSB provided by WFP is. But to be sure that no readers misunderstand, it is definitely NOT possible to completely replace breast milk with an unfortified mixture of mixture of groundnuts, soya beans,  and yellow corn. 
   
  I encourage readers to make use of the freely available linear programming tool that can be used to determine which nutrients are going to be adequate and inadequate in any daily food menu for infants of various ages (http://www.nutrisurvey.de/lp/lp.htm). Using this tool, one will see that an infant diet composed only of these foods will be  lacking in several key nutrients. 
   
  However, one must know about how much of each food an infant can eat and how complex of a diet a family can prepare for a baby to come up with reasonable diet plans. 
   
  Ted Greiner
  
 
   
------"Nkuoh Godlove" wrote:
 Dear Emmy     
�The Cameroon Baptist Convention Health Board is 
currenlty working on a trial of local food which 
was inteded for  infants after weaning; and also 
for non-Breast fed infants over 6 months. 
  
�This formula which we called High protein Baby 
formula  contains mixture of groundnuts, soya 
beans,  and yellow corn.   All these different grains 
are fried and crutched into powdered form and 
used for feeding the baby or adding to any dish. 
Sometimes mixed with tea. 
  
�During support group meetings,women are educated 
and supported  to prepare this mixture. 
Observations and reports  have shown that it has been 
effective not only for infants who are on artificial 
feeding, but also for PLWH .  It is also  hoped 
that this will be a safe & adequate substitute for  
breast milk.  There are however a number of 
challenges which we are facing like:     
�Sources of analysis to see if it can adequately 
substitute breast milk and packaging procedure to 
ensure minimal risk of contamination. 
  
�Labeling to ensure that users read contents & 
follow instructions for mixing. 
  This may not be exactly what Emmy is asking but 
something worth trying.
   
  Nkuoh Godlove