The Story Milk and eggs: How women’s bodies became a global commodity – The Saturday Story
Feb 28, 2026
Alev Scott, investigative journalist and author of Cash Cow who probes fertility and maternal-health industries. She explores online breastmilk markets and why men buy milk. She exposes for-profit milk processors, price gaps between informal trade and industrial products, and the booming, loosely regulated global egg-donation trade. She recounts undercover experiences in clinics and urges debate on ethics and regulation.
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Unexpected Male Demand For Breast Milk
- Alev Scott set up an OnlyTheBreast account expecting adoptive or low-supply parents but was mostly approached by men seeking milk or sexual services.
- Within hours she received requests for pumped videos, adult wet nursing, and bodybuilder claims, which propelled deeper investigation.
Meeting A Self-Styled Milk Connoisseur
- Alev met a man in his 60s who claimed to drink breast milk for IBS and described himself as a connoisseur of milk qualities.
- He admitted to paying for adult wet nursing and could distinguish subtle differences like refrigerated-then-frozen versus straight-to-freezer milk.
Milk Donations Turned Into Profitable Medical Products
- Commercial milk companies present as altruistic but buy donor milk then process it into expensive hospital products, profiting from donations.
- Alev found powdered fortifiers sold to hospitals for about $189 per litre while donors receive far less.
