'Remain calm': Baby formula shortage impacting Canadians
A recall of baby formula, compounded by supply chain issues, is causing concern for families in Canada as well as in the United States, where the the effects are being felt even more sharply.
“My first piece of advice is to remain calm,” says lactation consultant Michelle Pensa Branco of SafelyFed Canada.
The shortage has affected major Canadian retailers.
In a statement, Walmart Canada said the ongoing global challenges with baby formula supply has "persisted for a number of years."
"Despite these challenges, we continue to work closely with our suppliers to secure a strong supply of baby formula across multiple brands and formats (concentrates, powder and ready-to-feed), to make available for sale both in-store and online”.
Loblaw is also experiencing shortages from one major U.S. manufacturer, but says it has supplies from other vendors.
Branco says the shortage is difficult for those in rural areas, who often drive hundreds of kilometres for their groceries and don’t have the options city-dwellers have.
She is also concerned about children with medical conditions such as dairy allergies.
“A good number of parents using these products don’t have a diagnosis of dairy allergy,“ she said, adding these parents are simply using them because of advice from friends or out of an overabundance of caution.
She says switching brands of formula is rarely a problem for babies because the contents of most formulas is very similar and easy to digest.
Other alternatives include breastfeeding more, using donor milk and increasing solid food intake for older babies.
That way, she says, supplies of baby formula will be more secure for babies that truly have particular medical reasons for a special diet.
CTVNews.ca Top Stories
Parents of infant who died in wrong-way crash on Ontario's Hwy. 401 were in same vehicle
Ontario’s Special Investigations Unit has released new details about a wrong-way collision in Whitby on Monday night that claimed the lives of four people.
Three Quebec men from same family father hundreds of children
Three men in Quebec from the same family have fathered more than 600 children.
B.C. mayor stripped of budget, barred from committees over Indigenous residential schools book
A British Columbia mayor has been censured by city council – stripping him of his travel and lobbying budgets and removing him from city committees – for allegedly distributing a book that questions the history of Indigenous residential schools in Canada.
OPP's mandatory alcohol screening during traffic stops 'not acceptable': CCLA
A spike in impaired driving-related collisions has caused Ontario’s provincial police to begin enforcing mandatory alcohol screening (MAS) at all traffic stops in the Greater Toronto Area -- a move one civil rights group says is ‘not acceptable.’
Maple Leafs down Bruins 2-1 to force Game 7
William Nylander scored twice and Joseph Woll made 22 saves as the Toronto Maple Leafs downed the Boston Bruins 2-1 on Thursday to force Game 7 in their first-round series.
Jurors in Trump hush money trial hear recording of pivotal call on plan to buy affair story
Jurors in the hush money trial of Donald Trump heard a recording Thursday of him discussing with his then-lawyer and personal fixer a plan to purchase the silence of a Playboy model who has said she had an affair with the former president.
Southern Alberta store broken into by burly black bear
Staff at a small southern Alberta office supply store were shocked to find someone had broken into the business last week, but they were even more confused when they discovered the culprit was a bear.
Captain sentenced to 4 years for criminal negligence in fiery deaths of 34 aboard scuba boat
A federal judge on Thursday sentenced a scuba dive boat captain to four years in custody and three years supervised release for criminal negligence after 34 people died in a fire aboard the vessel.
New scam targets Canada Carbon Rebate recipients
Fake text message and email campaigns trying to get money and information out of unsuspecting Canadian taxpayers have started circulating, just months after the federal government rebranded the carbon tax rebate the Canada Carbon Rebate.