How Good Is Infant Formula (Economist)

Summary

A Well Informed column on whether the "extras" in modern formula (prebiotics, probiotics, long-chain polyunsaturated fatty acids, LCPUFAs) deliver the brain, eye and immune benefits their labels claim. Verdict: today's formulas are safe and nutritious, the FDA mandates minimum levels of 30 nutrients, but the evidence for the premium additives is equivocal, and the marketing runs ahead of the science. Breast-feeding's advantages over any formula remain well established. See Infant Formula.

Key claims

• Claims audit (BMJ, 2023; 757 products, 15 rich and poor countries). The most common claim, on just over half of products that claimed any benefit, was support for brain, eye or nervous-system development. Three-quarters of products cited no scientific reference; of references cited, only half were clinical trials; fewer than a third of those were registered; and among registered randomised trials, nine in ten claims rested on evidence the trial's own authors rated high-risk-of-bias. Industry funding was common. Formula is regulated as food, not medicine, so claims need no trial backing.
• LCPUFA evidence, against: a review of 15 RCTs, 1,889 infants (last updated 2017) found no better brain development or visual acuity with LCPUFA-supplemented formula; a 2021 study of 1,607 British adolescents found no academic edge from supplemented formula in infancy.
• LCPUFA evidence, for: a 2025 meta-analysis in Nutrients of 9 RCTs, 1,039 babies found a slight but statistically significant cognitive-development gain with formulas supplemented with ARA and DHA; the FDA notes premature babies may benefit most.
• Breast-feeding: many studies link it with lower infant infection rates; several recent ones with lower asthma and allergy rates; it is cheaper even after the mother's extra calories. The FDA and most rich-country health bodies call it optimal.

What the article flags as unproven or contested

• High risk of bias in marketing-cited trials does not prove the claims false; it means they are unproven.
• The LCPUFA literature points both ways (null in the larger 2017 review and the 2021 adolescent follow-up; small positive in the 2025 meta-analysis). Effect size, if real, is small, and the preterm subgroup is where it is most plausible.
• The piece's real worry is behavioural: slick, science-flavoured marketing undermining breast-feeding, not that formula harms babies.

Wikilinks

• Infant Formula — concept page.
• The Economist — Science & Technology / Well Informed.

Captured-by trigger

Source file: raw/processed/Economist 2026-06-27 Science---Techn - How good is infant formula.md.