Breastfeeding is essential to child survival

UNICEF and WHO call for stronger commitment in favor of feeding practices for all infants and young children. To encourage governments to promote and protect exclusive breastfeeding of children, UNICEF and WHO today jointly launched the Global Strategy for infant and young child.

This document, prepared after two years of consultations around the world, identifies the main problems of feeding practices for infants and young children and proposes solutions for them.

"There is nothing better than breastfeeding to give the child a healthy start in life," said Carol Bellamy, Executive Director of UNICEF. "Our strategy provides a plan that will allow governments to create a climate in which women can make informed decisions regarding feeding their children. "

In addition to protecting the health of babies during the first six months of life, breast milk alone provides ideal nutrition because it contains all the nutrients, antibodies, hormones, immune factors and antioxidants necessary for healthy being of the baby. It protects babies against diarrhea, acute respiratory infections while stimulating their immune system.

"Almost all mothers can breastfeed if they are properly informed and are supported by their families, their communities and the health system," said Lee Jong-Wook, Director General of WHO. "Governments must take prompt and effective action to implement this important strategy. "

The fact of not being breastfed - and especially not to be exclusively breastfed during the first six months of life - is a major risk factor for morbidity and mortality for infants and young children. And the situation is worse when inadequate supplementary feeding is given to children as they grow.

"Exclusive breastfeeding during the first six months of life, combined later with adequate food, help to reduce the number of children under five who die from malnutrition," said Lee Jong-Wook. Malnutrition is a factor associated with more than half of deaths among children under five years.

The strategy calls for significantly increasing the number of babies exclusively breastfed. Currently, about 39 percent of infants worldwide are benefiting from this practice during the first six months of life. A supplementary feeding is often given too early or too late, and has inadequate or unsafe food from a nutritional standpoint. The malnourished children who survive are sick more often and suffer all their lives the consequences of underdevelopment.

"In the long term, poor nutrition of infants and young children results in poor school performance, productivity and limited intellectual and social development," said Bellamy.

The strategy highlights the link between health and nutritional status of mothers and children and also studied the problem of feeding young children in especially difficult circumstances such as natural disasters.

The strategy also addresses the question of food to give to the millions of children born annually to mothers with HIV. Between 10 and 20 per cent of them are infected at birth, but there is an additional risk of HIV transmission through breast milk - which is 5 to 20 percent estimated.

This risk must be weighed and compared to the risk of morbidity and increased mortality when infants are not breastfed. All HIV-positive mothers should receive information on risks and benefits of options at their disposal, as well as tips for choosing the one that best suits them.

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