Have you heard about the mother and daughter separated in Spain - please sign this petition.

[Otta]

Heidi, what you've basically posted there are blogs. I suspect social services had rather more to go on. Yes the experts all agree (as would any sane person), that taking a child from it's mother because she won't wean it, is absolutely wrong, and if this organisation is indeed trying to do that, then urgent investigation is needed. HOWEVER, what you seem to be ignoring, is the fact that there may be far more serious issues in this case. I've never worked in Spanish social services, but I can promise you, social services in the uk do not take kids from parents without very very good cause. I suspect Spain is much the same.

[mockney piers]

In fact the doctor quoted there is the one who described the breastfeeding regime as chaotic. She obviously feels bad that her findings have contributed to the situation and is speaking out, but she obviously doesn't have all the information to hand.

http://www.elpais.com/articulo/sociedad/Separada/hija/darle/pecho/elpepusoc/20110608elpepusoc_9/Tes

And neither do I so I'm inclined not to prejudge the situation. There's a judicial investigation to ensure things have been done right.

http://www.elpais.com/articulo/sociedad/fiscalia/pide/juez/informe/medico/psicosocial/Habiba/elpepusoc/20110620elpepusoc_10/Tes

Mistakes do occur and when children are removed from a parent it better be for very very good reasons (and ideally should be placed with family, but I guess as she's Moroccan she may not have any support network in the country) but then noone wants a Baby P to happen through inaction do they.

Damned if you do....

[Saffron]

It's breastfeeding awareness week. Here is an interesting case with a breastfeeding angle (albeit other possible angles too), concerning a cross-border dispute (the mother is not-Spanish) involving a European country... and WHERE IS the BBC? Can we get some REAL news on this case?

From their own webpage, the BBC thinks it's more important to report on Galliano's trial and 50-Cent's new book.

Here is the link I found on the BBC site to request that they investigate impartially. I am including Habiba's name and a link to this thread on the EDF in my message. I hope you will too.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/newswatch/ukfs/hi/newsid_4030000/newsid_4032600/4032695.stm

[StraferJack]

I suspect that the BBC is not disinterested in the case, but is taking an editorial view that there are too many unknowns to make any report meaningful - so any report they can legally publish would add nothing to the known facts

[Otta]

Exactly!

[Moos]

You mean, StraferJack, that they're too disinterested to be interested at this time, although they aren't uninterested? ;)

[mockney piers]

beat me to it fellow pedant !! :-D

[Saffron]

StraferJack Wrote:

-------------------------------------------------------

> I suspect that the BBC is not disinterested in the

> case, but is taking an editorial view that there

> are too many unknowns to make any report

> meaningful - so any report they can legally

> publish would add nothing to the known facts

They're a news agency, a large news agency, a large powerful news agency, a well-funded large powerful news agency. They certainly have the resources and the ability to investigate, if they think people are interested.

[mockney piers]

In all fairness these family issues happen all day every day all over the place. The only difference is that a social media campaign has sprung up in this case. 3,000 members does not a BBC news story make, though the fact that it's made the papers in Spain and forced a judicial review might be.

[StraferJack]

they can investigate all they like, but that doesn't mean they are legally free to publish everything they find

[Saffron]

The case has gone public in Spain. What would be stopping them from publishing?

Perhaps family issues should be more frequently reported, home or abroad. The fact that family issues happen frequently and are not reported, does not make this case any less worthy. Indeed, as I pointed out previously, this is Breastfeeding Awareness Week, so there is already a news angle built into this story.

[mockney piers]

Very few details have been published in spain though. it's mostly opinion pieces to be fair. the only concrete news is that the Madrid body in question think the mum's a bit of a nutter, the breastfeeding consultant seems to regret the 'chaotic' conclusion she came to and a judicial review has been ordered.

So it seems to me that the only thing that makes this different than the thousands of such cases daily that don't make the beeb is that someone latched on to it and a social media campaign has started. If it's of interest to bloggers and forum commentators then that's great and clearly the coverage is large in the non mainstream media.

But perhaps the beeb are waiting to see if anything interesting comes out of it and in the meantime is spending their reduced correspondent budget on things like renewed violence in Northern Ireland, Cameron's coalition on action in Libya dissolving and the immenent collapse of the Greek economy ;-)

[Saffron]

Nope, they're spending their budget on Galliano and 50 cent. It's on their webpage.

[mockney piers]

They're probably just rehashing a Heat story ;)

Plus, wholly depressingly, people seem to care more about that :(

[Saffron]

Perhaps we should be asking Heat to investigate the story in Spain?

;-)

[mockney piers]

You may jest but it'd get a huge amount more exposure than some byline in the dark recesses of the bbc news website where it'd get slightly fewer hits than a story about a new roundabout in the isle of man.

If it's any consolation as a Spaniard myself (from Majadahonda, the Madrid suburb in question funnily enough) I read the Spanish press quite a bit and none of it gets reported here. Even the recent elections where the Socialists were massively punished by the electorate didn't even make it beyond p93!

[Belle]

It's the kind of story that cd make Grazia (they do that token section on news stories from around the world)

[Dulwich Born And Bred]

Update !!! She got her back! Fab news!!!

[bluesuperted]

Fantastic! I will search out information now... thanks for posting!

[StraferJack]

information on this is pret-tay hard to come by

Any sources?

[EDmummy]

I sincerely hope it is "fab news". So, if it all goes wrong will there be a similar petition against the return of a child to a reported "violent" situation. Sadly very few stories can sensibly give us both sides to these types of situations.

[apenn]

When I read the link from the original post I must admit that I was sceptical that the entire story was being told as it was quite obvious that they only published report excerpts that support the petition cause, however I decided to sign the petition anyway for the following reasons:

1. Regardless of other evidence that may have been in the report, breastfeeding on demand, baby-led weaning, and co-sleeping should not have been cited in a medical report as evidence of a mother's incompetance. This in itself needs to be addressed even if there were other issues at play.

2. Due legal process was not followed (admittedly, I took this on faith as presented in the article)

3. Unless there was imminent danger to the child, removing a breatfeeding child without proper weaning must have been extremely traumatic to the child.

I'm glad to hear the child was returned to her mother - and I hope that if the mother is involved in an abusive relationship or has real mental health issues that social services there monitor the situation and intervene to protect both mother and child.

-A

[sophiechristophy]

Well said apenn, agree 100%.