‘Breast is best’ campaign waning

Exclusively breastfeeding newborn babies for six months has declined over the years as a result of a number of myths that surround the practice, according to UNICEF representative Janet Cupidon Quallo.

“Jamaican statistics have shown that there has been a steady decline in the percentage of children exclusively breastfed,” she said. “Sixty point two in 1983 to 50.7 per cent in 1993 to 47 per cent in 2001.”

Quallo made this revelation late 2003 while speaking at the Conference of Nutritional Coordinators.

She said many myths associated with breastfeeding were found during a study conducted by the Ministry of education in 2002.

“It is seen by many mothers as a practice of the poor,” Quallo said.

Financial status, she added is another myth, as men prefer to purchase the formula to demonstrate their ability to contribute to their families.

Violette Griffith, programme development officer for the chronic disease unit at the Ministry of Health and a member of the National Breastfeeding Committee, added that women believed that their breasts would sag if they breastfed for six months. “It has to do with the pregnancy experience,” she said.

Some mothers, according to Griffiths, were of the view that if they had to work in the sun, the heat would spoil their milk.

Griffiths also mentioned that some mothers would deem their milk unfit for the baby if they saw a thin yellowish fluid secreted at the time of parturition that precedes the production of true milk which is called fore milk or colostrum.

She said with such low levels of exclusive breastfeeding, there is a high prevalence of HIV and the high seasonal incidence of water-borne disease.

“It is now urgent to clearly communicate the advantages of exclusive breastfeeding, the higher risk that non-exclusive breastfeeding represents in the transmission of HIV/AIDS, and the risk associated with the mixing of infant formula with unsafe drinking water,” she said.

“We need to reach the mothers and the fathers of young children for whom breastfeeding is often not seen as the preferred choice,” she appealed.

The failure of mothers to exclusively breastfeed infants is one of the major contributors to malnutrition and gastroenteritis, respiratory tract infection and infant mortality in Jamaica, according to Minister of Health John Junor. Breastfeeding is well below the target of 70 per cent.

“Exclusive breastfeeding is said to have an impact on preventing some diseases, especially the chronic nutrition-related diseases,” Minister Junor said.

Exclusive breastfeeding is defined as giving no other food or drink to the infant, not even water with the exception of drops containing medicine as prescribed by the doctor. “Children should continue to be breastfed for up to two years of age and beyond, while receiving appropriate and adequate complementary foods,” Quallo said. “Several studies attest to the strong correlation between good infant feeding practices and reduced mortality and morbidity rates for children from birth to one year old.”

She also reiterated some of the benefits of breastfeeding such as the nutritional, immunological and developmental advantage and the contraceptive value. “The economic reason is evident,” she added. “Breastfeeding is convenient as it needs no sterilisation and it is always at the right temperature.The production of breast milk has no direct cost and it is unnecessary to purchase any food supply for the baby before six months.”