Senate Bill S7569

                                 BILL NUMBER:  S7569

 TITLE OF BILL :  An act to amend the public health law, in relation
to requiring human breast milk banks, companies and cooperatives to
comply with certain standards and to provide for education and support
of certain breastfeeding mothers

 PURPOSE OR GENERAL IDEA OF BILL :

To establish a regulatory, educational, and lactation support system
for breast milk banks in New York State.

 SUMMARY OF SPECIFIC PROVISIONS :

§ 2505-b. Breast milk banks.

1. Procuring, processing, storing, distributing and using human milk
for the purpose of infant human consumption from a nonprofit human
breast milk bank is a rendering of a service and not the sale of human
milk for profit or financial gain.

2. A hospital or organization that collects, processes, stores, or
distributes human milk either from a mother exclusively for her own
child or from a mother to nourish a child other than her own shall
comply with the standards, ethical practices and guidelines for
collecting, processing, storing, or distributing human milk of the
              

Human Milk Banking Association of North America unless the department
approves alternate standards.

3. No screening test is required to be performed on human milk
collected from a mother exclusively for her own child.

4. A for-profit human breast milk bank, company, or cooperative that
provides financial compensation or shares in stock for procuring,
processing, distributing, or using human milk for the purpose of human
consumption must comply with the standards, ethical practices and
guidelines of the Human Milk Banking Association of North America or
more stringent guidelines for safe procurement, processing, storing,
or distribution of human breast milk.

5. (a) A for-profit human breast milk bank, company, or cooperative
working with breastfeeding mothers in this state can only accept milk
from a mother who is at least one hundred and eighty days postpartum.
(b) A for-profit human breast milk bank, company, or cooperative
operating in this state cannot remit payment to a participating mother
until at least twenty-eight days after receipt and acceptance of the
expressed human breast milk.

6. A for-profit human breast milk bank, company, or cooperative shall
work with local, community-based lactation support groups to provide
ongoing breastfeeding education and lactation support for its
participating mothers to ensure that the needs of the nursing children
of participating mothers are the priority and are adequately nourished
by the mother's own breast milk.

7. A for-profit human breast milk bank, company, or cooperative
operating in this state shall ensure that, at a minimum, fifty percent
of the human breast milk produced by participating mothers in a
specific locality is distributed to hospitals in this state for the
hospital's neonatal intensive care unit or to local nonprofit human
breast milk banks to provide human breast milk for vulnerable
premature or ill infants or for distribution to foster parents or
adoptive parents in this state who wish to provide breast milk for
their foster or adoptive newborn or infant children.


8. A for-profit human breast milk bank operating in this state shall
conduct an annual audit, at its own expense, that clearly demonstrates
whether or not the distribution of breast milk collected complies with
the requirements of subdivision six of this section.  The for-profit
human breast milk bank shall submit a report with the findings of the
audit to the department no later than January thirty-first, two
thousand seventeen and every January thirty-first annually thereafter.

9. A for-profit human breast milk bank that does not comply with the
provisions of subdivision eight of this section shall be responsible
for a fine to be determined by the commissioner. The comptroller shall
credit the money from such fines to the department for use in infant
mortality prevention projects.

10. The provisions of this section shall not apply to mother-to-mother
milk sharing groups.

 JUSTIFICATION :

Currently there is not a regulatory, educational, nor lactation
support system for breast milk banks established by the State of New
York. The regulation of human breast milk banks is critical to ensure
the availability, quality control, and auditing of human breast milk.
An educational mechanism is critical to ensure that the public is
properly informed about the benefits that breast milk provides for the
human growth and developmental benefits of infants throughout the
development of the first few years of a young child's life. An
educational mechanism is also critical to ensure proper methods of
providing human breast milk to such children by means of direct breast
feeding or nursing, wet nursing, collection and bottle feeding,
schedule and timing of feeding, and any other necessary information
regarding the use of, acquiring of, distribution of, and ingestion of
human breast milk for infants throughout the optimal period for which
such human breast milk is beneficial for optimal growth and
development of infants and young children. A support system is
critical to ensuring the proper and optimal practice of breast feeding
or nursing, as well as encouraging and providing support for nursing
mothers, breast milk providers, and surrogate parents who provide
breast milk from breast milk banks to their foster, guardianship, or
adopted child.

 PRIOR LEGISLATIVE HISTORY :

None

 FISCAL IMPLICATIONS :

To be determined

 EFFECTIVE DATE :
This act shall take effect on the first of January next succeeding the
date upon which it shall have become a law.