KOCHI: Breastfeeding stands as an unparalleled means of providing infants with the best possible nourishment for their healthy development. It is the natural process of nourishing a newborn or infant through breast milk produced by the mother’s mammary glands.
However, statistics from the World Health Organisation (WHO) and UNICEF reveal that in 2019, the global rate of exclusive breastfeeding in the first six months of life was only 41 per cent. As a result, designating the first week of August as World Breastfeeding Week annually becomes imperative to promote breastfeeding and safeguard the well-being of both mother and baby.
Throughout the latter part of the first year and up to one-third of the second year of life, breast milk continues to provide a significant portion, if not more, of a child’s nutritional requirements, furnishing all the essential energy and nutrients during the initial months of life.
This year’s theme, ‘Enhancing Breastfeeding: Empowering Working Parents,’ holds exceptional significance, given that workplace-related challenges remain a primary factor leading women to either forgo breastfeeding entirely or discontinue it earlier than recommended.
UNICEF has identified four key policy areas to promote child well-being, empower women, and facilitate respectable work conditions for caregivers:
Granting adequate paid leave to all parents and caregivers, regardless of their involvement in formal or informal economies, to cater to the needs of their young children.
Supporting mothers to exclusively breastfeed for the initial six months, adhering to the guidelines set forth by the World Health Organisation and UNICEF, and allowing them to continue breastfeeding for as long as they choose.
Ensuring that all children can access reasonably priced, high-quality childcare and early education.
Extending child benefits and fair wages to assist families in providing for their young children.
Furthermore, to assist working mothers, it is essential to establish a breastfeeding room within the workplace—an exclusive, well-equipped, clean area where mothers can breastfeed, express milk, and safely store it.
The role of milk banks
A human milk bank, often referred to as a breast milk bank or lactarium, undertakes the collection, screening, processing, pasteurisation, and regulated distribution of human milk, contributed by nursing mothers unrelated to the recipient infant.
This initiative seeks to bolster breastfeeding on a global scale. According to the WHO, the foremost alternative when a biological mother cannot breastfeed is to employ human milk from alternative sources.
Human milk banks in underdeveloped countries play a pivotal role in facilitating the use of breast milk, providing donor milk as essential support to the most vulnerable preterm newborns, especially in cases where the mother’s milk is unavailable.
Educating parents about the merits of human breast milk or pasteurised donor breast milk is indispensable for informed parental decisions in formulating an optimal feeding plan for hospitalized neonates.
In order to boost breastfeeding rates and lessen disparities, enacting policy changes, overhauling systems, and creating an environment that tackles breastfeeding obstacles—such as promoting better maternity care practices, implementing paid leave policies, and establishing supportive facilities—can prove instrumental.
(Dr Nandini Mannadath is the assistant professor nursing department, college of Health and Sport Sciences, University of Bahrain. She was the former vice-principal of Aswini College of Nursing in Thrissur, Kerala.)