A trans woman activist who appeared on ITV News as a ‘struggling mother’ has shared a photo of her breastfeeding her child and said she only stopped doing so after she had a cancer relapse.
Mika Minio-Paluello – a former Labour special adviser – was seen during Wednesday night’s News At Ten programme doing the washing up while she spoke of how the soaring water bills were ‘tough if you’re a mum’.
The segment led to criticism from feminists including Labour MP Rosie Duffield, who wrote: ‘Dear @itvnews, I am sure this is a lovely, intelligent and decent human being. This was an important piece. This is not however a struggling ”mother”.’
Ms Minio-Paluello, who was born male, also complained about viewers ‘obsessing’ over a breast pump that could be seen in the footage and said it belonged to a housemate.
And after a feminist campaigner responded to the row by mentioning that Ms Minio-Paluello had been ‘simulating breastfeeding’, she hit back by saying that ‘trans women can breastfeed’ before sharing a photo of herself doing so.
Trans women can make themselves lactate by taking a combination of medicines that tricks the body into making milk.
In 2018, a 30-year-old transgender woman became the first officially recorded to breastfeed her baby and was able to produce 227 grams of milk a day.
As she shared the image, Ms Minio-Paluello wrote: ‘In the end, I only breastfed my child for a few weeks. I then had to stop because I had a cancer relapse and didn’t want to poison my child.
‘Here’s me on the bus to hospital for the 1st chemo round, feeding my child for the last time.’
This prompted further debate, with critics replying to the photo by saying it was not possible for someone with male sexual organs to breastfeed.
Trans women can make themselves lactate by taking a combination of medicines called the Newman-Goldfarb protocol.
It was originally developed for biological women who adopted or had a child via surrogacy and wanted to breastfeed.
The method involves taking hormone boosting medications, including the pill.
Other drugs that are used include anti-sickness medicine metoclopramide, heart medication digitalis and anti-psychotic chlorpromazine and sedative medications which are known to increase prolactin, the hormone responsible for milk production.
Domperidone, an anti-nausea drug, is the preferred option for the protocol as it has fewer potentially dangerous side effects.
However, the regimen is not completely risk free. The drug can pass into breast milk in small amounts and can sometimes give babies an irregular heartbeat as a result.
The drug regime is used in conjunction with a breast pump to mimic the changes a women’s body undergoes during the late stages of pregnancy and shortly after the birth of a child.
Experts have urged caution about transwomen using the Newman-Goldfarb protocol to lactate.
They have warned that long-term health implications from using the treatment, for both adult and baby, are unknown.
There have been separate rare cases of biological men undergoing lactation in the past without deliberately setting out to do so.
These are usually the result of a rare medication side effect influencing hormone production, or from a hormone-disorder.It is unclear how many other trans women have been able to breastfeed since the first recorded case in 2018.
There are also very few studies and no scientific consensus about the nutritional quality of the breastmilk produced.
However, one this year, published in the Journal of Human Lactation found it contained similar levels of lactose, proteins and electrolytes.
