Breastfeeding Peer Counselors Lose Cell Phones

[annettemarie]

http://www.wivb.com/Global/story.asp?S=8103854

Tammy Bieber, breastfeeding peer counselor, "I have a lot of moms who are delivering any day now who I gave my number to, told them to count on me you have 24 hours assistance, call on me to help, now I can't help."

[KirstenMary]

Since her phone is grant funded, taking it away makes no sense.

[PatienceAndLove]

Never heard about this... interesting.

[frontierpsych]

wait, I'm confused, are cell phones illegal there? Why do they take them away? Am I missing something?

[annettemarie]

They took them away "to save money."

[Can Dance]

stupid people. it IS going to cost them money, the babies end up on formula and sick. duh.

[CalebsMama05]

I had to reply to the comments, although I probably shouldn't have...so many people were all for *saving money* by cutting out those cell phones...I just had to do the math for them since they obviously weren't capable of it themselves!

let's do the math here, one cell phone is what,$80 a month? going on Tammy's numbers she counsels 200 women. A can of formula provided by wic (which is funded by taxpayer money) is $13 (or so) when my oldest was formula fed he got 9 cans on wic. That is $117 a month. lets say half of Tammy's women (so to speak) fail to continue breastfeeding...and then recieve 9 cans of formula per month on wic. that's $11,700 a MONTH that could have been saved by paying an $80 cell phone bill. Wow what brilliant people we have running our cities/counties/country these days. Let's cut $80 and end up spending thousands instead. bravo!

[lacysmommy]

Jami, hate to be a downer for the cause here, but... WIC gets rebates for about 95% of the cost of formula on all types of formula. So that $117 a month for formula amounts to about $6 a month per infant. So yeah $80 for a phone is still less than $1200, but it's not as dramatic. I loathe the WIC formula rebates for a lot of reasons, mainly because it jacks up the formula costs for non-WIC moms, and that just seems dirty to me.

[annettemarie]

Mamas, I know it seems nit-picky, but while discussing the article and the actual event is OK, discussing the comments is against the UA:

Do not post to invite MDC members to other boards for adversarial purposes or post inflammatory information about MDC discussions at other boards, or about communities and discussions elsewhere, regardless of whether or not you link to that discussion or community. This is to maintain and respect the integrity of our own and other communities.

Sorry!

[jeca]

Since they have had them for three years why not let them keep them and simply stop from getting any new ones?

[p1gg1e]

Is there a reason they cant contact their clients and tell them to call on a LAN line?

[Livviesmom0207]

That's so sad. There aren't enough peer counselors in this area. I went through 3 days of training and then my local WIC lost their funding, so I'm trained, but not peer counseling.

It kills me.

[Twinklefae]

Originally Posted by p1gg1e

Is there a reason they cant contact their clients and tell them to call on a LAN line?

They didn't get any warning that they would lose their phones, so the numbers are saved on them. If they had had warning it wouldn't be so bad.

[RoadWorkAhead]

Originally Posted by lacysmommy

Jami, hate to be a downer for the cause here, but... WIC gets rebates for about 95% of the cost of formula on all types of formula. So that $117 a month for formula amounts to about $6 a month per infant. So yeah $80 for a phone is still less than $1200, but it's not as dramatic. I loathe the WIC formula rebates for a lot of reasons, mainly because it jacks up the formula costs for non-WIC moms, and that just seems dirty to me.

Not always true. What if a mama with a kid like mine who might have been able to BF having cut ut dairy, or soy, or something simple ends up not BFing...Thats over 330$/month in formula for just one baby WITHOUT rebaates. Our formula is made by either Mead or Ross...I think Ross, but not a rebate style formula. And its not that uncommon for kids to end up on some of the more expensive direct distribution formulas. (They provide it to you direct as its too expensive to do otherwise). So while yes, they get them on some formulas, think about the just 1 kid that might not have ended up on a special formula. Now those kids really cost them.