For the past few months, I’ve been fielding questions about the baby formula crisis. Make no mistake, the shortage of baby formula is indeed a crisis.

Breast milk is the ideal food for baby providing nearly complete nutrition the first year of life. But not every ba e or mother can breastfeed. For exam y infants with galactosemia are unable e metabolize milk sugar, and mothers w certain infections risk passing them n their babies through breastmilk.

Babies are delicate. Their immature bodies rely on having just the right intake of water and salts, and just the right composition of proteins, fats, and carbohydrates. Their organs can’t keep that balance independently, the way healthy older children and adults can. Formula is carefully designed for this.

Breast milk is the ideal food for baby, providing nearly complete nutrition for the first year of life. But not every baby or mother can breastfeed. For example, infants with galactosemia are unable to metabolize milk sugar, and mothers with certain infections risk passing them to their babies through breastmilk.

Sometimes we can induce the production of breast milk, but this is a usually difficult and always time-consuming process. It isn’t an option for the mother staring at an empty formula shelf while her two-month-old cries in hunger. And solid foods are not a safe option for babies under four to six months of age as they aren’t physically ready to swallow or digest them.

As science progressed, we learned to pasteurize milk, and to produce sweetened condensed and evaporated milk. We learned about the nutritional gaps between human and animal milk, and we began to understand why the latter was not good for babies.

By the mid-20th century, most formula fed babies drank a homemade concoction based on evaporated milk, water, and sugar. These home formulas were susceptible to contamination, and difficult to get balanced just right.

Modern baby formula is the result of centuries of science. With it, millions of babies grow and thrive. Not having access threatens lives.