Breast-feeding, weight gains, diarrhea, and malnutrition in the first year of life.

Despite lack of agreement among specialists as to the ideal length of the breast-feeding period, it seems clear that most Chilean mothers have tended to keep that period very short. Various studies demonstrate ‘the point. For example, a 1968 study of 600 infants seen at both urban and rural health centers of the Northern Santiago Health Area reported that by two months of age 50% of these infants were already being fed breast-milk substitutes (1). Another study, conducted between September 1975 and August 1976, found that only half of a group of study subjects (1,050 infants from various social strata) were being breast-fed for three months (2). It has been asserted that in Chile, as in other Latin American countries, one of the foremost causes of malnutrition is the brevity and insufficiency of breast-feeding (1). This assertion gives emphasis to the need for encouragement and prolongation of breast-feeding-not only to avert nutritional deficiency, but also to reduce the infections that often occur as a consequence of malnutrition.