First week’s comment contest recipient: Nursing Mother’s Counsel of Oregon
By:
NWHF Staff
| Posted on: December 10th, 2008
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Categories:
Disparities •
Economic Issues •
Food & Nutrition •
Public Health
We received 24 comments during the first week of our four-week contest, and selected the winning entry using an internet-based random number generator.
Caitlyn Howell, writer of the winning comment, said “answering the ‘What’s your community health priority?’ poll was hard! Money, public education, and advocacy in support of any of the thirteen options would benefit the vitality of our community. But as I mulled over the options, I thought about our family’s scary descent into economic uncertainty and the necessary abandonment of many of our dearly held values; and realized, to my dismay and sadness, that no amount of attention to these issues will help us much. We need steady, reliable living-wage jobs (forget benefits; we need income for our basic needs). Our financial situation - unanticipated and unfamiliar to us - is, for too many Pacific Northwest families, an everyday, every-year, every-generation reality.”
Caitlyn’s comment is yet another articulate reminder that economic disparities and other social inequalities are core determinants of the public’s health and addressing those determinants is a critical factor to improving the health of all.
Caitlyn told us she chose Nursing Mother’s Counsel of Oregon in large part because she knows that “their efforts to help babies receive the critical nutrition they need - and moms reap nursing-related health benefits - will pay off years from now.”
She said “the Nursing Mother’s Counsel plays a vital role in our community at all levels: direct support (telephone and in-person peer counseling for nursing moms), reduced or free services for low-income mothers, public education, and advocacy at the state level. Your donation will truly have an immediate impact on not only the current health of families in our area but also the future health of our community.”
Thanks for taking the time to make your thoughtful comment, Caitlyn, and for choosing such a worthy community organization to direct your donation!
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Thank you Caitlyn and Community Health Priotities for the $500 donation to Nursing Mothers Counsel of Oregon. I volunteer with NMC and I feel breastfeeding has wide public health implications in our community. Babies who are exclusively breastfed for their first 6 months have less risk of ear infections, hospitalizations from respiratory infection, asthma and lifelong obesity. What else can you do for 6 months that has lifelong positive health effects? Breastfeeding has health benefits for Mom too, and is better for the environment and is more economical than formula feeding. It also promotes mother-child attachment in the sweetest of ways. What hurdle do we face as a community that wouldn’t be well served by healthier, happier, better connected families?