Can someone explain what all the letters and scientific words commercials use in milk formulas for children are for?

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All I can remember is DHA, and I searched it and it says that it’s a omega 3 fatty acid. But the commercials then continue to say like a hundred more things in it, and they’re all scientific names as though every mother would know what those are that are supposed to do that are amazing for their children.

Sure the usual ones like the vitamin a, b, c, d, e, etc, probably many will know of, but then there are other names thrown in there that I have no idea what are and what they do for the children.

Not a mother, maybe that’s why I don’t know what they are, but I’m just curious what they are and what they’re supposed to be.

And follow up question, does breast milk have all of the stuff in formulas? If so, that’s amazing.

(P.S. Not sure if the flair is right, sorry.)

In: Biology

Anonymous 0 Comments

Breast milk is indeed an amazing substance. It contains all the macro and micro nutrients a human baby needs, in exactly the right proportions to support their development. Evolution has optimized it over eons to be the ideal food for a baby. Everyone recommends it as what a baby should be consuming, without anything else, for the first 6 months of life.

That said, not every mother can breast feed her child that way. Formula is an attempt to produce a synthetic substance which mimics breast milk. It’s made through a very different process, and those chemicals are just the “recipe” used to try and get the right molecules in the right relationships. They are included on the labeling because there is a law requiring that, not because most mothers have the chemistry background to understand them.