Start Date: July 2019

ID #: CAS053

Organization: Public Health Advocacy Institute, Inc.

Project Lead: Cara Wilking, JD

See more related research

Share


Despite the evidence that breastfeeding is best for infants, expectant mothers and families with infants are bombarded with marketing for breast milk substitutes (BMS) in ever more intrusive ways via digital marketing techniques. The goal of this study is to conduct legal analysis and develop preliminary policy recommendations under United States law on the potential role of formal privacy regulation; private, contractual user agreements; and BMS industry self-regulation to protect consumers when they utilize social media platforms and otherwise generate personal data that can be harvested and sold to marketers for targeted BMS marketing. The policy analysis has three aims: Aim 1: Briefly summarize BMS marketing tactics and existing policies (or lack thereof) that have created the current BMS marketing environment; Aim 2: Conduct legal research and analysis to identify and describe policy approaches at the following levels: a) Formal privacy protections for expectant mothers under state or federal law to protect them from invasive BMS marketing; b) The potential use of contractual user agreements and company privacy policies to protect pregnancy-related data from being harvested and sold to marketers; and c) Voluntary industry action by the BMS industry akin to what the food industry has done for its marketing to children through the Children’s Advertising Review Unit and the Children’s Food and Beverage Advertising Initiative; and Aim 3: Provide preliminary policy recommendations to address the issues identified.

Related Research

October 2024

Evidence-Based Recommendations to Mitigate Harms from Digital Food Marketing to Children Ages 2-17

Digital food and beverage marketing is embedded in nearly every platform children use (websites, mobile apps, social media, video sharing, gaming, streaming TV), promoting unhealthy foods and beverages, which is harming children’s health. Healthy Eating Research convened an expert panel to develop evidence-based recommendations for actions to mitigate harms from digital food marketing to children More

September 2024

Water Is K’é: Learning from the Navajo Community to Promote Early Child Health

Drinking water instead of sugary drinks is key to reducing health disparities. Since beverage habits are shaped by complex personal, community, and environmental factors, community input is critical to design any intervention promoting water. The research team worked with community partners to design a program to promote healthy beverage habits among young Navajo children. The More

August 2024

Community-based diet and obesity-related policy, system, and environmental interventions for obesity prevention during the first 1000 days: A scoping review

Community-based policy, systems, and environmental interventions have the potential to reduce modifiable risk factors for obesity early in life. The purpose of this scoping review was to characterize the breadth, generalizability, and methodological quality of community-based diet and obesity-related policy, system, and environmental interventions during the first 1000 days of life, from pregnancy to 24 months More