Breastfeeding has great benefits for the cognitive and physical development of the baby, as pointed out by the World Health Organization, which recommends this exclusive feeding during the first six months of life. But breastfeeding also has advantages for the mother’s health, such as less chance of developing breast cancer, ovarian cancer or tumors. It is a decision in which the woman must have complete autonomy, but, in many cases, breastfeeding is a privilege.
To discuss the benefits, practices, myths and challenges of breastfeeding, France 24 spoke with Vanessa Velasquez-Rousseau, IBCLC Breastfeeding Consultant and member of the Canadian Association of Lactation Consultants. Also, through his Instagram account @lactanciamitosperforms educational work that reaches more than half a million people.
France 24: The WHO recommends breastfeeding for the first six months of the baby’s life and then a prolongation until two years of age, what benefits does breast milk have for the cognitive and physical development of minors?
Vanessa Velasquez-Rousseau: We really have to be clear that breastfeeding is the natural means of feeding human babies. The benefit is in the fact that it contains everything a baby needs, it lacks nothing and has nothing to spare. So, by default, we have to understand that it is the natural way of feeding babies so that they develop perfectly in all aspects.
France 24: The million-dollar industry of formula milk, through advertising, has also managed to reach millions of mothers. What are the consequences and risks for the development of a newborn of feeding a baby with formula milk? Is there an overconsumption?
VVR: You have to know how to separate the industry, the advertising, for that excessive consumption of the formula of the product from the formula itself, because in many cases it saves lives. This extreme advertising must be separated from what the formula itself means as a product.
Yes, there is marketing, advertising that invites excessive use and since the formula is precisely a product that is designed to nourish babies, to feed babies, but to date a formula has not been achieved that equal, much less superior, to breastfeeding.
There are some disadvantages to the use of formula because it lacks these so-called “benefits” that breastfeeding has, but really more than benefits are immunoglobulin antibodies, they are components present in breast milk that are necessary for the proper development of a baby. If we go to the formula, it is not a harmful product, but it does have some disadvantages when it is positioned or compared to breastfeeding.
🔸 La #lactanciamaterna da 🤱🏾 vida 🌼.
🔸 Mejora el sistema inmunológico de los 👧🏻🧑🏾🦱 niños.
🔸 Provee protección contra enfermedades, incluso en la edad adulta.Durante #COVID19 🦠 alentamos a las madres a continuar con la #LactanciaMaterna.#SMLM2022 #ApoyandoyEducando pic.twitter.com/66emC5hUxp
— OPS/OMS (@opsoms) August 1, 2022
France 24: There are scientific studies that indicate that breastfeeding for a long time would reduce the risk of breast cancer and other hormonal tumors…
VVR: That breastfeeding that extends beyond 6 and 12 months has been shown to help reduce the risk of cancer, tumors… Not only is it an act that will be beneficial from every point of view for the baby, but also for mom. It even helps the mother to regain her weight, it will benefit her health in a general way, in addition to the health of her baby.
France 24: What are the most common myths surrounding breastfeeding?
VVR: There are too many myths on this subject, many because of beliefs passed down from generation to generation. Many others unfortunately created or a consequence of the very advertising of the formula industry. Among these, the most popular are the belief that having enough milk production is a matter of luck, that some women or most women, unfortunately, are believed in this way to not have the ability to produce enough milk.
This is completely false. In fact, 95% of the human population, of breastfeeding women have enough milk production to exclusively breastfeed their babies if they so choose. There is also a myth that the quality of the milk is not good enough or that it lacks nutrients; this is also completely false.
And one of the most painful is thinking that some emotions like crying or being angry can harm the milk or harm the baby, which is also completely false because our emotions cannot affect the components of breast milk.
It is necessary that there be training in lactation and even in lactation consulting for all professionals who come into contact with lactating mothers, not necessarily paediatrics. Any (health) professional who comes into contact with a woman and this woman breastfeeds needs to be trained in breastfeeding.
France 24: For millions of women around the world, breastfeeding is a privilege. What solutions can be offered to women who want to breastfeed and continue working?
VVR: In some countries, public health policies are not designed at all to offer equal opportunities to women and men. Most of these countries have a patriarchal system that is designed by men for men, for the benefit of the man, without considering that the woman experiences the pregnancy. This is a decision of each woman, whether or not she wants to have children, but for women who choose to have children there is still a system that is not designed for them or their babies.
It is not just about allowing the mother to breastfeed her baby and having a maternity leave that allows her to breastfeed the baby. That contact between mother and baby is a need of the minor, it is a right to have that contact between mother and child.
Holding a baby skin-to-skin and only breastfeeding 🤱🏻 meets their needs for:
✅ warmth
✅ nutrition
✅ stimulation
✅ protection from disease
✅ love
while also helping them develop
#WorldBreastfeedingWeek pic.twitter.com/BkzyTlPNUA— WHO Zimbabwe (@WHO_Zimbabwe) August 3, 2022
In most countries that do not have a maternity leave of at least six months, it is extremely difficult to achieve exclusive breastfeeding or even breastfeeding in many cases. This is out of what all entities and all public health institutions worldwide recommend; since all recommend exclusive breastfeeding for at least six months and continue breastfeeding for at least two years, accompanied by food.
These licenses, in some places, they want to make them look like, or this same patriarchal society wants to make it look like a vacation, which could not be further from the truth. It is an unpaid job, extremely exhausting, with no time or date on the calendar, no holidays or weekends. It is imperative to analyze the way in which public health policies govern maternity leave or the absence of maternity leave, as is the case in the United States, where it is practically non-existent if the mother or the woman or the the nursing person has the privilege of even enjoying a few weeks.
In the case of the Afro-American population, since there is systematic racism, the possibilities of the Afro-American woman are not the same as those of the white or Caucasian woman. By default, they often work one or even four jobs to support themselves by doing almost impossible to breastfeed their babies. The privileges between white women and African-American women may be very different and of course this will directly affect the rates of breastfeeding between them.
France 24: Some feminist activists criticize this type of upbringing, pointing out that breastfeeding confines women to the home environment… And another part of society punishes women who do not breastfeed as “bad mothers”. .
What the feminist movement is really looking for is equal rights so that a woman can decide and have the same opportunity to decide if she wants to stay at home and work on raising her child and her food, or if she wants to go back to work.
The patriarchal system has been the one that has exposed that women must stay at home to raise children and take care of men, but once this system realized that it was also in need of women’s labor, it began, very to her comfort and to her agreement, to say that the woman had to be free, she had to be independent, she had to go to work. There was a change of speech. In fact, this also happened at the same time that the use of the formula began to be implemented. These slogans began to come out of “the formula is going to free you or it is going to allow you to return to work”, but really this is still part of the very system that is trying to decide for women.
In neither of the two approaches is the woman who has a baby really deciding what she wants to do because she really does not have that equal right to choose. Normally, the mother who decides to stay at home depends directly on having a partner that she can provide financially. Mothers who do not have the financial means to support themselves, who do not have the possibility of enjoying paid maternity leave that allows them to raise children, have to return to work or have deferred breastfeeding or switch to feeding with formula milk.
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