Well, folks, the Russian mad scientists are at it again!  Instead of goats, this time they have genetically manipulated mice to produce more human-like breast milk.  Their intention is eventually to improve mass produced baby formula.

The article goes on to discuss the logistics of milking mice on an industrial scale (not very practical), vs the logistics of the already established dairy farm industry with cows or goats.  The mice need to be anesthesized to be breastpumped (who’d'a’ thunk it), whereas cows and goats are much easier to get a hold of, and (as I’ve witnessed) are perfectly happy to sidle up to milking machines. (Take that PETA.)

In my post a few months ago about genetically modified goats producing human-like breast milk, I was sounding the alarm that farm animals producing humanized breast milk not only threaten the breast pump industry, they might even take a chunk out of the popularity of breastfeeding itself.    Using a breast pump in a work environment is hard enough.  Besides the privacy issues, there are the logistics of cleaning the pump, and chilling and transporting the milk.   Opening a can of humanized dairy milk will be very tempting for a lot of working mothers, since it won’t carry quite all the hazards of (blah) “traditional” formula.

As for competing with breastfeeding itself, friends did point out that there is so much more to breastfeeding, the immunity factors, the individually customized milk for each child, and the mother-child relationship itself, than bottle feeding with humanized dairy milk can ever provide.  And that’s true…. for now.   But where will it be 50-100 years from now?   With each step the scientists take in genetically engineering the dairy animals toward mimicking human breast milk more closely, that will be one less quiver in our quill we can use to overcome societal objections to breastfeeding.   We are only just now winning legal battles in protecting breastfeeding mothers in public.  It’s still not a given, in some places in the U.S.

So over the next few decades, get ready for the dueling campaigns, of Madison Avenue vs breastfeeding mothers, with the big money on the GM engineered dairy farm formula, and on trying to keep public breastfeeding as socially uncomfortable as possible.  The problem, of which, will be solvable “only” by buying their GM baby formula products.

I’m not too suspicious, am I?