BANKE HUMANOG MLEKA I SRODSTVO PO MLEKU U ISLAMU - PROBLEMI I PERSPEKTIVE
Human Milk Banks and Milk Kinship in Islam – Problems and Perspectives

Summary/Abstract: Human milk banks are non-profitable organizations which have been established in order to collect, screen, process and distribute donor breastmilk. Even though they are known to the society since the early twentieth century, at the end of last century they experienced massive proliferation. Currently, there are over seven hundred and fifty human milk banks in the world, but their geographical positioning is uneven – most of them are located in Europe, Latin and North America. The establishment of human milk banks in the “Muslim world” is blocked by existence of specific kind of kinship – milk kinship – which is codified and institutionalized by Qur’an, hadiths and sharia. The intention of this paper is to answer the question why does the concept of milk kinship, when it is in collision with the way that human milk banks are organized, causes such divergence within Muslim community. At the same time, the emergence of “bioethics” itself represents one of the most crucial events of twentieth century. In relation to this, the aim of the paper is to cover main Islamic bioethical tenets, as well as the stances of Islamic “bioethical bodies” toward human milk banks. Qur’an and hadiths were used as main theological-juristic foundation of Islam, along with fatwas issued by individuals and Islamic organizations. Special attention will be paid to the fatwa written by Yusuf al-Qaradawi, as It represents one of the most significant problematizations of human milk banking phenomenon.

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