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Monday, December 13, 2004
Editorial: Manna in milk
Give milk for Christmas.
A self-effacing Jenny Tadena becomes upfront when individuals call to ask her what can they donate as Christmas cheer for the orphans at the Reception and Study Center for Children (RSCC).
Social welfare officer Tadena is practical rather than sentimental. She politely suggests that, rather than toys and parties, milk will be far more useful.
As the RSCC’s officer-in-charge, Tadena has to prioritize the needs of her wards. She says that many visitors of their nursery often mistake the two dozen or so infants and toddlers as the sole beneficiaries of RSCC.
But aside from the center-based orphans, the facility also caters to 25 older orphans living with foster families, as well as 25 infants staying with community-based families in crisis.
Maintaining these children’s health in tiptop shape while securing their futures by matching them with adoptive families is a mission requiring governmental flexibility, civic-mindedness and a good dose of nutritional wisdom.
Best for babies
All of the infants in the RSCC nursery are either surrendered or abandoned. While government auditing procedures may emphasize availing of the commodity with the lowest price, Tadena will not settle for less when it comes to the milk intake of her babies.
That is because most of the foundlings frequently arrive at the facility in the worst of health. As a consequence of having mothers who come from impoverished families, skipped prenatal check-ups, and did not enjoy good nutrition during their pregnancies, the infants are underweight and sickly. Separation anxiety makes them even more irritable.
After noting that cheap milk formula causes a breakout of rashes, the passing of bloody stools and crying fits, Tadena and her fellow workers put the more sensitive babies on a diet of hypoallergenic milk during the first three months. This has unfailingly worked miracles on the infants.
However, it will require civic-mindedness to sustain this feeding program. A 900-gram can of a medium-priced brand of hypoallergenic milk costs a little more than P600. A week-old baby, fed on demand, will easily consume the contents of a can of this volume in a week.
Thus, despite their pediatrician’s advice that the more vulnerable infants should be fed this special type of formula during the first 12 months, RSCC staff begin introducing a cheaper alternative by the second month. Lugaw (porridge) is given on the fourth month, with liquefied meat and vegetables introduced later, to decrease milk dependence without affecting the infants’ development.
However, the RSCC has no control over the number of infants surrendered to them nor on delays in the matching of their wards for adoption. At present, seven infants have been placed on the hypoallergenic milk diet. The yearend is often the period that shows up the disparity between budgeted purchases and actual needs, a gap that, Tadena hopes, will be filled in by charitable individuals and organizations.
Milk for others
Aside from the center-based individuals, the RSCC also gives milk assistance to children up to six months who live with families in crisis. For undersized twins or triplets, the assistance can be extended until nine months to a year.
A family in crisis is one having an infant that has either no mother to breastfeed or no resources to purchase milk formula. Tadena narrates the case of a father who wanted to surrender his infant to the RSCC after his wife became insane and he had other children to take care of.
Tadena asked the man if he had relatives, who could care for the infant, with RSCC supplying the milk until the child could be weaned. This program of the social welfare agency is intended to respond to infants in distress while keeping them based in the community so that the space at the RSCC can be prioritized for foundlings and abandoned infants without any families to care for them.
Low-cost milk is allocated for families in crisis, a state of affairs that could be improved if more individuals and organizations were to share the “milk of human kindness” with the smallest and most helpless of their brethren.
(December 13, 2004 issue)
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