August 2022 Parenta magazine

World Breastfeeding
This month sees the start of World
Breastfeeding Week (WBW), which runs
from the 1st – 7th August each year. It
is the annual campaign coordinated
by the World Alliance for Breastfeeding
Action (WABA) that aims to “inform,
anchor, engage and galvanise action on
breastfeeding and related issues.” The
week was started in 1992 to generate
public awareness and support for
breastfeeding, and since 2016, the WBW
campaign has been aligned to the United
Nation’s Sustainable Development Goals
which aim to “end poverty, protect the
planet and ensure prosperity for everyone
by 2030.
Humans have been breastfeeding their
babies for thousands of years and is a
natural and instinctive behaviour for both
mother and child. We would not have
survived as a species had we not been
able to provide our youngest infants
with nutrition in their early months from
breastfeeding. So why is there a need to
promote breastfeeding, you may ask?
The WHO have recognised that
breastfeeding is essential for children to
achieve optimal growth, development
and health and they recommend that
children start breastfeeding within the
first hour of life and breastfeed exclusively
for the first 6 months. Thereafter, the
WHO recommend they “receive adequate
and safe complementary foods while
breastfeeding continues up to the age of 2
years or beyond”.
Whilst many in the UK do not breastfeed
as long as that, breastfeeding is described
by the UK Government as “an important
public health priority” and they go on to
say that:
…“increasing the number of
babies who are breastfed offers the
best possible start in life. Breastfeeding
improves infant and maternal health and
well-being in both the short and longer
term.”
Week
Research about
breastfeeding
In many low- and middle-income
countries, breastfeeding is more prevalent
than in high-income countries and is
inversely associated with the national
gross domestic product (GDP), so the
higher the country’s income, the lower the
rates of breastfeeding, and the lower a
country’s income, the higher the rates of
breastfeeding. Lower income families also
tend to breastfeed for longer.
This could be due to a number of factors
including: