Breast milk saves lives of sick, premature and orphaned infants
I am so pleased that Quick International was able to participate in this life-saving endeavor. Breast milk is a key intervention to promote child health and survival.
New York, NY (PRWEB) November 15, 2016
The US-based International Breast Milk Project (IBMP), Prolacta Bioscience and Quick International Courier joined forces once again in a humanitarian effort to deliver donor breast milk for premature, sick and orphaned infants in South Africa.
Quick provided the cold chain logistics planning and end-to-end transport of the shipment to the orphanage. Over 15,000 ounces of donor breast milk was picked up in Monrovia, CA, and delivered within three days in late October to iThemba Lethu in Durban, South Africa, a transition home for orphaned and abandoned children.
To maintain the integrity of the milk and its nutritional value, it was crucial to maintain a specific temperature throughout transit. The milk was packed in dry ice, a frozen carbon dioxide, with surface temperature of -109.3 degrees Fahrenheit (-78.5 degrees C) that maintained the required frozen temperature from California to South Africa. The temperature was monitored at all checkpoints throughout transport.
Breast milk provides optimum nutrition for infants, providing nutrients and immune properties. Many babies who are cared for at Ithemba Lethu are malnourished and immune-compromised when they are received into their care. Breast milk provides the nutrients they need to thrive, helping to reduce infection by strengthening their immune system, and is especially beneficial for those babies who are HIV infected.
"I am so pleased that Quick International Courier was able to participate in this life-saving endeavor by providing secure cold chain transportation. Delivery of breast milk is crucial in these areas, because one-third of the people in South African towns are HIV positive, which makes recruiting healthy local milk donors very difficult. In the developing world, breast milk feeding is a key intervention to promote child health and survival,” says Dominique Brown, Chief Executive Officer, The Quick Group of Companies.
About Quick International Courier
Quick is a highly specialized, global shipping and logistics provider focused on designing customized delivery solutions for time and temperature sensitive, mission-critical and life saving needs across a wide range of industries. For over 35 years, Quick has been providing the world’s leading companies with the most reliable and innovative logistics solutions.
Quick specializes in shipping organs and blood for transplant, personalized medicine, medical devices and investigational drugs for the healthcare and pharmaceutical industries, as well as critical and high-value parts for the aviation, high tech, and manufacturing industries.
About iThemba Lethu
iThemba Lethu is a local Durban non-governmental organization devoted to helping vulnerable babies, children, youth and families regain a meaningful destiny by recognizing the value of their lives and the importance of being in a secure family environment.
The iThemba Lethu Breast milk Bank is the first community-based human milk bank in South Africa. It was opened in 2001 by Professor Anna Coutsoudis, who had a vision to restore a destiny of hope and promise to those babies and children whose futures were at risk of being negatively impacted by HIV/AIDS. The orphaned and abandoned babies in their care at two Transition Homes receive donor breast milk, and also provide breast milk to babies in neonatal ICU’s at private and public hospitals.
About the International Breast Milk Project (IBMP)
IBMP helps new moms in the U.S. join the fight against poverty and disease by providing an avenue to donate breast milk to infants in South Africa and around the world. The donor milk is unquestionably lifesaving for many of the tiny, premature babies who receive it. Because so many babies have been abandoned, orphaned or have moms that are too sick or malnourished to breastfeed, there is a significant gap in the current supply of available local milk. http://www.breastmilkproject.org/
Prolacta Bioscience
Prolacta Bioscience is a privately held, life sciences company dedicated to improving the quality of life in the most fragile infants through the harmony of nature and science. They create specialty formulations made from human milk for the nutritional needs of premature infants in neonatal intensive care units (NICU).
Prolacta developed the first large-scale human milk processing facility in the world. Using state-of-the-art formulation, pasteurization and filling processes, they formulate human milk to an exact standard to meet the needs of very low birth weight babies during the first 30 days of life.
Contact: Marie T. Vigliarolo
Quick International Courier, A Quick Company
718.995.3616 ext. 2207
marie_vigliarolo(at)qintl(dot)com
http://www.quick.aero
