Public health round-up

Many societies are failing to adequately support women to breastfeed their babies, and as a result, most of the world’s children do not reap the full benefits of breastfeeding, according to two new reports. The first report, entitled Nurturing the health and wealth of nations: the investment case for breastfeeding, was developed by the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) and the World Health Organization (WHO) in collaboration with the Global Breastfeeding Collective, a new initiative launched last month to increase breastfeeding globally. Governments need to invest more in the promotion of breastfeeding, including paid family leave and workplace breastfeeding policies, and full implementation of the International code of marketing of breast-milk substitutes, according to the report. The authors estimated that an investment of US$ 4.70 per newborn to promote breastfeeding could save the lives of 520 000 children and generate economic returns of US$ 300 billion across lowand middle-income countries by 2025. Investment in breastfeeding globally is low. Each year, governments in lowand middle-income countries spend some US$ 250 million on breastfeeding promotion while donors provide only an additional US$ 85 million. In the second report, Global breastfeeding, 2017: tracking progress for breastfeeding policies and programmes, WHO and UNICEF found that no countries are adequately protecting, promoting or supporting breastfeeding through funding or policies. An estimated 40% of all children younger than six months are breastfed exclusively (given nothing but breastmilk), and exclusive breastfeeding is above 60% in only 23 of 194 countries. Breastfeeding helps to prevent diarrhoea and pneumonia, two major causes of death in infants, and reduces the risk of ovarian and breast cancer in mothers. The campaign was launched during World Breastfeeding Week from 1–7 August. http://www.who.int/mediacentre/ news/releases/2017/lack-investmentbreastfeeding