Biden's Baby Formula Shortage Worsening - If you can't get 'em in the womb, starve 'em out

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At the outset of his presidency, Joe Biden promised competence by a bigger, better government. A few days ago, one of his loyal allies exposed a gross incompetence by federal officials on Biden’s watch that defied that promise and inflamed a baby formula shortage now panicking parents nationwide.

Rep. Rose DeLauro, D-Conn., a reliable liberal ally, unveiled documents showing the Biden Food and Drug Administration was alerted by a whistleblower last fall about potential contamination issues at the Abbott Nutrition baby formula factory in Michigan and failed for months to act aggressively.

“The FDA reacted far too slowly to this report,” DeLauro said in releasing a letter to the Health and Human Services inspector general demanding an immediate investigation to an incident that has led to babies being sickened and dying and a belated recall that has emptied shelves of formula nationwide.

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DeLauro_OIG Request Infant Formula Recall.pdf
The congresswoman, the chairwoman of the powerful House Appropriations Committee, laid out a four-month-long trail of federal bumbles and stumbles: the report came in Oct. 20, the whistleblower didn’t even get interviewed for two months, the plant didn’t get inspected until Jan. 31 and the recall didn’t get issued until Feb. 17.

“Why did the FDA not spring into action?” she implored during a congressional hearing. “Why did it take four months to pull this formula off store shelves? How many infants were fed contaminated formula during this time, by parents who trusted that the formula they were buying was safe? How many additional illnesses and deaths were there due to FDA’s slow response?”

Now the bureaucratic stumbling has escalated into a national crisis, as video of bare shelves and panicked parents harken in America some of the same fears and images as the bread lines and rationing that befell the Soviet Union in the early 1990s just before its collapse.

The problems began even before the recall as inflation, labor shortages and supply chain slowdowns began putting pressure on the baby food staple last fall.

In November, baby formula was already substantially more expensive and supply shortages had already risen to 11%. By the first week of April, the shortages had soared to 31%, and last week the number stood at a stunning 40%, according to statistics kept by Datasembly.

The escalating shortages have prompted major stores such as Target, CVS and Walgreens to ration supplies with purchase limits.

"This is a shocking number that you don't see for other categories," Datasembly CEO Ben Reich told CBS MoneyWatch on Friday.

The crisis has both political and personal consequences.

Many millennial and Gen Z child-bearing parents were part of the coalition that propelled Biden to his election win. And some parents are now facing life-and-death consequences, especially for children with rare digestive disorders.

"If this doesn’t get fixed soon, I don’t know how my son will survive," Phoebe Carter, whose 5-year-old son suffers from a rare digestive and immune system disease, told Politico on Saturday. "I just can’t stress that enough."

The poor and working class – whom Biden promised hope in his inaugural speech – are also disproportionately affected. A food bank in Seattle was so desperate to get some baby formula it recently held an emergency drive.

Alfredo Ortiz, president of the small business group Job Creators Network, said the baby formula crisis follows a pattern of other economic failures by the Biden administration.

“The only thing the Biden administration seems to be efficient at is burying their heads in the sand,” he said. “These are the same bureaucrats that told us for months that inflation was only transitory and would resolve itself. Then they tried to tell small business owners that their supply chain issues had been resolved even though we could all see cargo ships backed up for miles at several ports nationwide.

”Unfortunately, it comes as no surprise that they have failed to protect even the most innocent Americans from their incompetence,” he added.

The shortages are also raising fears that parents might be tempted to concoct their own formulas or water down current store-bought formulas to stretch supplies, two actions experts say are fraught with danger.

The FDA strongly urges parents not to make their own formulas, saying contamination and inadequate nutrients in home-brewed formulas can lead to everything from "severe nutritional imbalances to food-borne illnesses, both of which can be life-threatening."

"Making things at home off of a Google recipe is potentially very dangerous for your baby," Dr. Stephen Lauer, a pediatrician with the University of Kansas Health System, told WDAF TV station this week.

Meanwhile, parents are desperately pleading for help on social media.

"If the MSM can talk about the toilet paper shortage ever hour, they should be talking about the baby formula shortage at least. ...We ended finding the Amazon brand online but not everyone is so lucky to be able to feed that. Please share. This is every store!" Danielle Miller tweeted with a picture of an empty shelve of formula.

The article editorializes a little bit but also provides slightly more info about the source of the crisis than most of the normie press articles I found. Details are oddly sparse. Why would a problem with a very specialized medical formula have such sprawling impact? What supplies in which chains are disrupted, and why is it so difficult to find replacements? It's suspect how few questions are being asked by the press, let alone answered.

Overall, it's curious how little coverage this is receiving given both how important the issue is and how unusual it is for something like this to occur with a true life essential. The TP shortage got much more coverage- but no one is going to go hungry or die because they had to use a wet wipe.

For those who have not had children or are lucky enough to have never needed to supplement with formula, you may not know, you cannot just switch brands on the child suddenly without potentially having anything from extreme stomach upset to an actual medical emergency. It's similar to how dogs can't just switch foods suddenly without vomiting and getting the shits, but worse. Some babies will vomit blood from a brand that doesn't agree with them. It's even worse with infants who have some kind of medical need.

And for the bootstrap crew, you can't just start breastfeeding a child again after months on formula. The milk dries up and goes away. A lot of the kids who need formula were born early or had some other difficulty in their first days that resulted in them not being able to gain weight from breastfeeding. A lot of mothers try to keep breastfeeding on top of the formula feeds but the feedback system of the mammary glands is very fussy and it is almost impossible for many to keep this up, especially since it involves things like waking up every 2 hours at night on a schedule, on top of whatever waking up the infant does, and exhaustion in itself can make the milk dry up.

tl;dr There is a reason a lot of babies died before we had technology.

That this is not being treated as a national emergency and has been allowed to fester so long screams "sabotage."
 
How many people actually need formula vs just finding it more convenient to feed their child subpar tiddy substitute?
It's just easier to let BRAND take care of it. BRAND is so great.

The corporate-political complex is brainwashing women to give up their humanity and face away from their natural state in order to turn them into bimbos and make their children into slaves for the hierarchy.
 
You can't just turn the boob back on, and there are a LOT of reasons why people bottle feed instead of breastfeed.

One major one that everyone looks the other way on is two-income households or single mother. The mother has to go to work, and pumping doesn't always keep the milk flowing.

Mastitis is another one that stops breast-feeding.

OR, the woman might not have good breastmilk. There's a reason people hired wetnurses throughout history.

Or it just dries up.

Or they don't have enough.

And once a baby goes on formula, they only like that formula. Like the OP said, babies can get gas, ulcers, or constipated from switching formula.

This is a serious fucking problem and getting worse and worse.

I know it's bad enough that one of my neighbors who I've never got along with and don't really like came to me and asked if I still stocked formula in my stocks. He acted like it was like chewing glass to ask me.

Luckily, the Commissary on post still is fully loaded with formula, so I just restocked.
 
I know it's bad enough that one of my neighbors who I've never got along with and don't really like came to me and asked if I still stocked formula in my stocks. He acted like it was like chewing glass to ask me.

Luckily, the Commissary on post still is fully loaded with formula, so I just restocked.
Wait what? I thought you weren't going to indulge that nonsense after those types mocked you.
 
I could look that up, but since my post already answers the question of "why not just turn boob back on?" I refuse to dignify it.
Well, it's useful for prospective (or expectant) mothers to know if nothing else. I'm sure a lot of these women whose tiddies dried up could have sustained their milk supplies if they weren't YOLOing and Living, Laughing and Loving.
 
Wait what? I thought you weren't going to indulge that nonsense after those types mocked you.
It wasn't mocked. We just don't get along.

You know how some people you just can't fucking stand? No particular reason? You can't put your finger on it, you just don't like each other?

Me and him are like that.

Plus, it ain't about me and him, it's about his baby.

Plus, his wife and my wife get along. Me and him just don't like each other.
 
You can't just turn the boob back on, and there are a LOT of reasons why people bottle feed instead of breastfeed.

One major one that everyone looks the other way on is two-income households or single mother. The mother has to go to work, and pumping doesn't always keep the milk flowing.

Mastitis is another one that stops breast-feeding.

OR, the woman might not have good breastmilk. There's a reason people hired wetnurses throughout history.

Or it just dries up.

Or they don't have enough.

And once a baby goes on formula, they only like that formula. Like the OP said, babies can get gas, ulcers, or constipated from switching formula.

This is a serious fucking problem and getting worse and worse.

I know it's bad enough that one of my neighbors who I've never got along with and don't really like came to me and asked if I still stocked formula in my stocks. He acted like it was like chewing glass to ask me.

Luckily, the Commissary on post still is fully loaded with formula, so I just restocked.
All this and then the fact that the ability to coordinate between breathing and swallowing is a very late-developing neurological feature for humans, and if you're born even just 2-3 weeks early, you can have a rough enough time of it they have to feed you with a tube in the NICU because you almost choke to death trying to feed from mom. We'll have her pump milk to feed you, but the machine is not nearly as good at nursing as a real baby, and some women's bodies essentially detect fraud and shut the whole thing down. You can throw pills at her, have her get up every 2 hours to try again, have her take herbs, try every old wives' tale in the book- but often, just that week of the baby being unable to nurse convinces her body that it died and she needs to regain fertility and try again.
 
It wasn't mocked. We just don't get along.

You know how some people you just can't fucking stand? No particular reason? You can't put your finger on it, you just don't like each other?

Me and him are like that.

Plus, it ain't about me and him, it's about his baby.

Plus, his wife and my wife get along. Me and him just don't like each other.
Ah, fair enough. I just remembered older posts and assumed they were part of that cadre. Bigger man than I.
 
Well, it's useful for prospective (or expectant) mothers to know if nothing else. I'm sure a lot of these women whose tiddies dried up could have sustained their milk supplies if they weren't YOLOing and Living, Laughing and Loving.
I think YOLO ranks way down the list on why people use formula. It's on the list for sure, but formula is expensive and annoying to deal with (even in the hospital the food handling guidelines for it are far stricter than the ones for real milk, the stuff goes bad if you stare at it from a distance whereas you can leave real milk sitting out a shocking length of time- a big deal when you're a nurse with a lot of babies to feed and alarms going off.) Not the greatest way to YOLO in the first place. The true YOLO-ites Roe v Wade it.
 
Baby formula (Similac is one of the big names) is notorious for being shoplifted; every store I've been to has some sort of specialized fixture just for Similac that prevents you from "sweeping" shelves or similar tactics.

Since Biden and his cronies have basically let organized shoplifting gangs run wild, then yeah. Of course it's there's a shortage in normal markets.
 
Baby formula (Similac is one of the big names) is notorious for being shoplifted; every store I've been to has some sort of specialized fixture just for Similac that prevents you from "sweeping" shelves or similar tactics.

Since Biden and his cronies have basically let organized shoplifting gangs run wild, then yeah. Of course it's there's a shortage in normal markets.
Shoplifting gangs don't help, no doubt, but this is a problem in every region of the USA right now and not just the ghettos. The Yahoo article said the worst impact was in a few midwestern states I can't imagine have many of those gangs:

Six states – Tennessee, Texas, Missouri, Iowa, South Dakota and North Dakota – faced supply shortages higher than 50% the week starting April 24, Datasembly said. The metro area with the highest out-of-supply rate was San Antonio, with 57%, followed by Memphis & Nashville (52%), and Des Moines & Houston (50%).
 
How many people actually need formula vs just finding it more convenient to feed their child subpar tiddy substitute?

I have 3 kids and we breastfed for at least 6 months for each one (exclusively) and eventually went over to formula.

My wife and I both worked (opposite shifts) and formula was a god send for our first. I’d hit the kid with the Titty Juice first but if you ran out and she wasn’t acclimated to Formula…. It turned into a long ass night (she wouldn’t take a pacifier).

With all three, after about 6-9 months, the supply couldn’t keep up with the demand.

For some women, the milk doesn’t come in and for some it’s just painful. Our third kid we stopped breast feeding because he was turning my wife’s nipples bloody.

And once the titty juice dries up, it ain’t coming back and you’re stuck on formula. We tried to prolong the breast feeding as long as possible but we ended up on formula with all three.
 
Baby formula (Similac is one of the big names) is notorious for being shoplifted; every store I've been to has some sort of specialized fixture just for Similac that prevents you from "sweeping" shelves or similar tactics.

Since Biden and his cronies have basically let organized shoplifting gangs run wild, then yeah. Of course it's there's a shortage in normal markets.
When I was working in a grocery store a decade ago baby formula was top 3 most stolen items. Illegals would by their limit with WIC and then hide an extra can or three in their purse because they could sell it for a good price back in Mexico. I imagine now they just sweep the entire shelf into a backpack, and of course WIC got its increase extended into September of 2022, so I'm sure when they show up to the cash register with their little official slip of paper saying they get 6 cans a month they get those 6 cans for their personal use despite the shortage.
 
I have 3 kids and we breastfed for at least 6 months for each one (exclusively) and eventually went over to formula.

My wife and I both worked (opposite shifts) and formula was a god send for our first. I’d hit the kid with the Titty Juice first but if you ran out and she wasn’t acclimated to Formula…. It turned into a long ass night (she wouldn’t take a pacifier).

With all three, after about 6-9 months, the supply couldn’t keep up with the demand.

For some women, the milk doesn’t come in and for some it’s just painful. Our third kid we stopped breast feeding because he was turning my wife’s nipples bloody.

And once the titty juice dries up, it ain’t coming back and you’re stuck on formula. We tried to prolong the breast feeding as long as possible but we ended up on formula with all three.
Our daughter was miserable until we had some quack reccommend goat milk. I thought it was idiocy but it worked. I don't think sand niggers are completely irredeemable savages due to that. The biological realities of babies are very complex.
 
Shoplifting gangs don't help, no doubt, but this is a problem in every region of the USA right now and not just the ghettos. The Yahoo article said the worst impact was in a few midwestern states I can't imagine have many of those gangs:
Logistics would suggest that it would affect the whole system. There was a pronounced pasta shortage a few months ago (it's gotten a bit better now, though never recovered to pre-COVID levels) and the whole aisle got wiped. Even if it's just one popular brand, people start using other brands and types, which causes those to disappear at a higher rate as well.

If Walmart or Safeway or CVS or whatever was getting shoplifted in the West Coast, they're going to have to divert more resources to their other stores to keep some stock, so even if your local store was safe from organized groups of criminals, it hits the supply chain. And of course, it's total supply too, so if the big chains order more to provide for their West Coast holdings (Walmart, Target, CVS, Albertsons Cos., Kroger, and a few others), it leaves less for other providers--and because the big chains are the star accounts, they're getting priority over smaller chains in the Midwest.
 
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