Through my years of experience in women’s health care as an international board certified lactation consultant, I worked and lived in frustration, tolerating longstanding issues with the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) that stem from the fundamental premise that health care is a privilege. Access to care equates to ability to pay, and quality of care is distinguished by type of insurance.
In this current health insurance situation, higher premium payments do not buy better care. My frustration has now transformed into pure disdain. The gutting of HHS personnel and the dismissal of evidence-based health care policies reveals the true disinterest of the current administration in America’s health.
On Jan. 8, 2026, both HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., and Department of Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins announced their new 2025-2030 Dietary Guidelines for Americans. The secretaries proclaimed a return to basics as they presented the revamped food pyramid now symbolically turned upside-down.
HHS claims to be focused on resetting nutrition policy to combat the rise in chronic health conditions, including heart disease, obesity, and diabetes. For decades, scientific data has linked these conditions, in part, to poor, improper, and/or inadequate nutrition. Some policy changes HHS has announced since March 2025 appear positive, including the elimination of certain dyes in foods and the allowance of new plant-based dyes in foods. These changes exemplify HHS’s definition of a reset in miniature. A more fitting change to aid consumers would be to recategorize products containing these dyes as “treats” or “junk food” since they are highly processed concoctions of food.
The Center for Science in the Public Interest (CSPI), an independent advocacy group, reviewed the new Guidelines. CSPI explained that development of previous Guidelines has historically been a multi-step, evidence-based process normally conducted by a Dietary Guidelines Advisory Committee (DGAC). Previous DGACs were composed of a non-governmental, independent panel 10-20 experts. Approximately 50 years of rigorous research and data by previous panels yielded successive and improved guidelines that included the reduction in consumption of certain meats and animal fat found harmful to good health.
In contrast with the 2026 Guidelines, a newly formed panel called “Scientific Foundation for the Dietary Guidelines for Americans” was created. According to CSPI, this panel of policy makers is comprised of hand-picked insiders in the beef, dairy, and protein supplement industries. CSPI also reports that the Foundation did not follow established methodology nor conduct the transparent public protocols and peer reviews that all previous DCAGs adhered to. Consequently, the Foundation’s newly released Guidelines recommend consumption of butter, tallow, full-fat dairy, and a marked increase in the total daily intake of animal proteins.
Several organizations, such as the American Heart Association, the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics, American Society for Nutrition, and the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, expressed concern about the Guidelines rollbacks. They cited the Foundation’s lack of rigorous scientific review to support its recommendations, which ultimately can negatively impact the chronic health conditions that this HHS claims to want to combat.
How does this apply to the infant nutrition?
Got milk?
Since the beginning of life on earth, the offspring of mammals were fed their own mother’s milk from their own mother’s mammaries, or fed by other lactating mammaries when necessary, utilizing the female anatomy specifically designed for newborn and infant feeding. This feeding process is the essential characteristic of every mammalian species. Mammalian milk is a living biological nutrient that develops during pregnancy and modifies throughout the period of breastfeeding. Mammalian milk provides and adjusts nutrients required in various developmental stages of growth and protects against infection and certain medical conditions. There is abundant evidence in art and artifacts throughout history from all over the world of animals and humans feeding their newborns and infants via mammaries, yet contemporary mothers struggle to emulate human ancestors.
In modern industrialized—especially wealthy—countries, the majority of newborns are fed some amount of or only infant formula within the first six months of life. The 2022 U.S. Breastfeeding Report Card shows a rate of 24.9% of exclusive breastfeeding in their first six months of life. According to the 2023 UNICEF/WHO Global Breastfeeding Scorecard, in countries of Africa, Asia, and Oceania the rates of exclusive breastfeeding in the first six months of life have increased by 10 points over the past decade to 48%.
What conditions (excluding physical or medical) have impacted birthing mothers from providing essential mammalian nutrition to infants? New mothers and families encounter multiple social conditions under capitalism, including insufficient hospital and community breastfeeding resources, inhumane maternity leave policies, and low household incomes that necessitate early return to work. These conditions interrupt and impede sustainable development of the breastfeeding process. Similar to the new dietary guidelines, capitalist industries—dairy and infant formula manufacturing—are at the foundation of the negative impact to breastfeeding in the United States.
Transition stage
The formation, growth, and development of industrial centers in the late 19th century beckoned villagers and farmers to leave their livelihood and relocate to them. Farmers, tradesmen, and their families were enticed these centers—cities—with promises of steady incomes, improved living conditions, and in general, a happier life with housing, water, food, and medicine.
The health care model at this time also transitioned. At-home care once provided by family based on the recommendations of a local healer, not always a doctor, shifted to city hospitals. New medical specialties, including obstetrics and bacteriology and the vocation of nursing, found footing in city hospitals.
To seize profit from the volume of deliveries in hospitals, despite incomparable delivery experience, midwifery fell under siege. Hospital doctors discredited the important and popular work of female birth attendants and traditional cultural practices. What was historically a normal life cycle occurrence—pregnancy, childbirth, and lactation—tended to by midwives at home became a managed medical condition by doctors in hospitals. Institutional protocols were imposed on mothers as routines of care, several of which lasted throughout the 20th century.
One such protocol was the separation of newborns from mothers. While mothers rested (if possible) on beds in quiet rooms, babies remained in newborn nurseries for most of each day. Instead of calmly sleeping on or near mother to aid in transition from womb to world, babies burned precious energy stressfully crying for extended periods of time. Reuniting with mother only for the scheduled feeding proved challenging. Instead of getting to the business of latching, suckling, and swallowing, babies calmed and perhaps slept when held by mothers. This scenario was starkly different from those depicted in historical artifacts.
The reality is that babies utilize their powerful sense of smell to understand their environment. Research has shown that the scent of mother and her milk are present in the womb, which can calm a baby after birth when in direct proximity of these scents. A stressed baby that experienced separation requires several minutes to calm, commonly in the arms of its mother. Baby may even fall asleep from the comfort it feels before feeling the sense of hunger or demonstrating readiness to feed.
The U.S. Breastfeeding Report Card also reported that approximately 84% of newborns initiated breastfeeding within the first two days of life, while 19.2% were fed some amount of formula. Breastfeeding attempts with a swaddled and/or sleepy newborn are overwhelmingly inadequate or unsuccessful. Instead of receiving factual breastfeeding education or skilled assistance, mothers are often told by pediatricians and nurses that their first milk, colostrum (“liquid gold”), is inadequate or that they do not have enough milk, leading to feedings by bottle of a breast milk substitute—formula. When a mother witnesses how easily her baby sucks on a bottle and consumes most if not all of its contents, she begins to question the breastfeeding process or her own body’s ability to produce an equal volume.
After returning home, families rely on formula to feed baby when encountering breastfeeding difficulties or when access to skilled lactation assistance is unavailable. Without consistent skilled lactation education and support, subsequent breastfeeding difficulties are “resolved” by a bottle.
It is now well understood that the hospital practice of separating a healthy newborn from its mother is harmful for the baby and contributes to breastfeeding failure. Although mother-baby separation policies have been eliminated in most U.S. birthing facilities since the early 2000s, several generations of mothers were unable to benefit from the wisdom of another’s experience, and countless offspring did not receive the benefits of breast milk. Yet, formula remains readily accessible.
Fool’s liquid gold
Industrialization in the U.S. and Europe also spawned mechanization of dairy milk processing, generating a surplus of cow’s milk. The substitute concoction for breast milk emerged in the mid-1800s to capitalize on this dairy surplus.
In 1856, Gail Borden (Borden Dairy Company) patented a process to condense milk (boiled-down milk water plus sugar) in the United States. Borden’s first profitable endeavor of canned condensed milk was financed by Ruehl Milbank, and together they formed New York Condensed Milk Company in 1858. More success followed after expansion into a new factory in 1864 that daily processed 20,000 gallons of milk supplied by over 200 dairy farmers. Canned condensed milk became an invaluable ration during the Civil War, which somehow transitioned into being invaluable for babies.
In 1867, Henri Nestlé developed farine lactée (wheat flour, malt, and sugar with cow’s milk), touted for saving the life of a baby that had rejected its mother’s milk. By 1873, Nestlé sold and shipped 500,000 boxes of Nestlé’s Infant Food to Europe, the United States, Argentina, Mexico, and the Dutch East Indies, estimated to cost $0.50 per bottle.
In this same period, former militiaman and then U.S. Vice Consul of Trade to Switzerland Charles Page and his brother, George Page, formed the Anglo-Swiss Condensed Milk Company. Anglo-Swiss used Borden’s patented process for its product, Milkmaid Brand canned condensed milk, which was advertised as the perfect mother’s milk substitute. By 1868, 374,000 cartons of Milkmaid Brand were sold primarily to Great Britain and its colonies, which spawned factory expansion across Europe and the U.S. Over time, improvements in cow’s milk processing and transporting reduced the cost of production, facilitated distribution, and increased profits.
However, these products were far from perfect. Infants around the world developed severe gastrointestinal illness and diarrhea that often resulted in death. Governments tested these products and deemed them nutritionally unsuitable for infants, impure, not sterile, and rife with microbes. In 1900, the U.S. estimated the rate of infant mortality due to contaminated breast milk substitutes to be 13%. In response to this catastrophe, public milk depots were established to distribute bottled pasteurized milk to the poor primarily in cities.
In 2011, African-American Surgeon General Dr. Regina Benjamin presented The Surgeon General’s Call to Action to Support Breastfeeding. This seminal call to action laid a roadmap to support and normalize breastfeeding across social, industrial, medical, and scientific infrastructures. It was, and is, the only federal directive to emphasize the importance of breastfeeding and generated supportive—though insufficient and short-lived—resources for mothers and babies.
Today, despite sterile processing conditions and formula fortification with manufactured additives said to be inspired by mother’s milk, the health of infants remains at risk. Two such ingredients are arachidonic acid (ARA) and docosahexaenoic acid (DHA). ARA and DHA are long-chain polyunsaturated fatty acids essential for the development of the brain, eyes, and immune system, and are naturally present in breast milk. ARA and DHA additives are produced from industrial fermentation of microalgae and fungi and extracted using the solvent hexane. As recently as Jan.13, 2026, Nestlé was forced to recall some infant formulas in several countries traced to possible bacterial contamination of ARA.
After 50-plus years of evidence-based research on the benefits of breastfeeding and the risks of formula feeding, why is formula so prevalent? It’s not a stretch of the imagination that multi-national formula manufacturers (specifically Nestlé/Gerber and Abbott Nutrition) stand to lose lots of milk money.
Count the money
Infant formula is extremely profitable for the manufacturers, and the U.S. Department of Agriculture generously contributes to their wealth. The largest domestic purchaser of infant formula is the federal food assistance program, Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants and Children (WIC). WIC distributes monthly food packages of basic nutrition—including only one brand of infant formula—to low income women and to children up to 5 years of age. Formula manufacturers are required to bid for a multi-year sole supplier contract for a state’s WIC program in order for their product to be distributed by WIC. The contract also requires the manufacturer to provide a rebate for each container of formula purchased by the state.
Currently, the only two formula manufacturers awarded WIC contracts are Nestlé S.A. and Abbott Laboratories. Reported revenues for these manufacturers in 2023-24 were estimated at $19.3 billion and $3.9 billion, respectively, and the value of manufacturer rebates to states totaled $1.6 billion. Adding to their coffers are the purchases of formula products by birthing facilities to align with the product distributed by WIC programs. Yet, these profits are not enough to satisfy manufacturers’ greed.
It is very common for a family to continue to feed the same brand of formula that was provided in the birthing facility. Formula manufacturers rely and profit on this behavior. On Jan. 15, 2025, U.S. Government Accountability Office reported that the winner of the sole supplier contract increased the retail cost of a 12-ounce container of powdered formula—the same container obtained from WIC—by 1.7%, on average, and a 0.3% price increase for other formula products of the same brand.
In the case of WIC participants, when their monthly supply of formula is exhausted, additional supply must be purchased out-of-pocket until the next month’s allotment is available. When the infant reaches six months of age, formula is removed from the monthly WIC supply. Families then assume full payment of formula for the remainder of the infant’s first year of life, the recommended duration of formula feeding.
While shopping for infant formula, consumers can find products labeled as a toddler nutritional drink to complement a toddler’s diet. These drinks are not regulated by the Food and Drug Administration. The American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) explains that in the absence of federal regulation, the composition of these drinks is inconsistent and perhaps nutritionally incomplete. AAP states these toddler nutrition drinks should be avoided even in situations of children with feeding difficulties and dependence on liquid nutrition.
Formula manufacturers have thrived from this surefire marketing strategy: insert themselves as invaluable to families for feeding their child and reducing their stress. In reality, the strategy is to profit by undermining the healthier but unprofitable choice of breastfeeding.
A genuine return to basics
Human milk is developed by the human body to provide for the fundamental growth, development, and health of infant bodies as newborns and throughout their lifespan. The body’s production of human milk is linked to providing many maternal health benefits, such as reduced risks of breast and ovarian cancer, type 2 diabetes, high blood pressure, and cardiovascular disease, the same chronic diseases targeted by the current HHS. If this current HHS cares for the health of people and not the health of profit, breastfeeding would be fundamental in its plan for resetting nutrition.
The capitalist drive for profit and wealth impacts the working class for their entire life span. Indeed, formula is invaluable in certain situations, including the maternal choice to not provide breast milk. However, the experimentation of artificial breast milk on vulnerable (presumed weaker) women and babies resulted in the institutionalization and normalization of a product with a dubious and harmful history. Generations of women were left to feel inadequate, guilty or even depressed (postpartum depression is estimated at 20% of mothers in the U.S.) for not successfully breastfeeding, and for possibly increasing the risk of ill health to their offspring and themselves.
Investment into healthy evidence-based practices, like wearing a seatbelt, not smoking, and breastfeeding, are investments in humanity. In my experience, the majority of pregnant women choose to breastfeed, but when asked why, most answers are based on the mantra “breast is best” without reciting benefits. The decision to breastfeed must be a standardized practice early in pregnancy and throughout the breastfeeding experience, with access to skilled lactation support for meaningful and practical education in every pregnancy, regardless of ability to pay or quality of insurance.
We should all call on this HHS to make a real return to basics by banning special interests and funding the policies and practices that truly support lifelong health.
This People’s World article was produced on behalf of the CPUSA Women’s Commission.
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