A Current Summary of Breastfeeding Legislation in the U.S.

By Elizabeth N. Baldwin, Esq., and Kenneth A. Friedman, Esq.

IMPORTANCE OF BREASTFEEDING

Breastfeeding is no longer considered to be a lifestyle choice, but a significant health and medical choice for both the mother and baby. As the American Academy of Pediatrics has stated in its new recommendations issued in December of 1997:

"Research in the United States, Canada, Europe, and other developed countries, among predominately middle-class populations, provides strong evidence that human milk feeding decreases the incidence and/or severity of diarrhea, lower respiratory inflection, otitis media, bacteremia, bacterial meningitis, botulism, urinary tract infection, and necrotizing enterocolitis. There are a number of studies that show a possible protective effect of human milk feeding against sudden death syndrome, insulin-dependent diabetes mellitus, Crohn's disease, ulcerative colitis, lymphoma, allergic diseases, and other chronic digestive diseases. Breastfeeding has also been related to possible enhancement of cognitive development." American Academy of Pediatrics, Work Group on Breastfeeding, "Breastfeeding and the Use of Human Milk", Pediatrics, Vol. 100 No. 6, December 1997. www.aap.org/policy/re9729.html

UNICEF and the World Health Organization recognize the importance of breastfeeding through age two and beyond. The Innocenti Declaration, sponsored by UNICEF and WHO, and adopted by 32 governments worldwide and 10 United Nations agencies, states: "As a global goal for optimal maternal and child health and nutrition, all women should be enabled to practice exclusive breastfeeding and all infants should be fed exclusively on breast milk from birth to four to six months of age. Thereafter, children should continue to breastfeed while receiving appropriate and adequate complementary foods for up to two years of age or beyond." Innocenti Declaration on the Protection, Promotion and Support of Breastfeeding, 1990.

UNICEF has taken steps to encourage physicians to promote breastfeeding, as set forth in former Executive Director James P. Grant's "Call to Physicians for Support" in 1994. He points out that although physicians have long known that breastfeeding is best for babies, there is now increasing awareness that breastfeeding plays a far more crucial role in the survival and healthy development of children in both industrialized and developing countries alike, than the medical profession ever before imagined. "Study after study now shows, for example, that babies who are not breastfed have higher rates of death, meningitis, childhood leukemia and other cancers, diabetes, respiratory illnesses, bacterial and viral infections, diarrhoeal diseases, otitis media, allergies, obesity and developmental delays. Women who do not breastfeed demonstrate a higher risk for breast and ovarian cancers." J.Grant, "Call to Physicians for Support", published in the July/August 1994 issue of the Baby-Friendly Hospital Initiative Newsletter.

More and more studies document the significant health benefits, including increased IQ, and the longer that women breastfeed, the more benefit to them and their children. For instance, a recent study from China indicates that a woman's risk of both pre and post menopausal breast cancer is reduced by 50% if she breastfeeds her children for at least two years. Many people in our society are finally realizing that there are economic as well as medical benefits if breastfeeding is promoted. Hundreds of millions of dollars could be saved if more women would breastfeed, and the US government did not have to purchase such large amounts of artificial baby milk for WIC participants, as well as absorb the cost of increased medical expenses for both mother and baby. It is for these reasons that laws have been passed that encourage women to breastfeed, as it benefits all of our society.

Last updated Saturday, July 29, 2006 2:25 AM by sjs.

Page last edited Sun Oct 14 09:33:13 UTC 2007.