Natural Family Planning International

Breastfeeding may reduce postpartum depression. A study of 14,000 mothers showed that women who breastfed their babies were at significantly lower risk of postnatal depression than those who did not. In particular, mothers who planned to breastfeed and who actually went on to breastfeed were around 50% less likely to become depressed than mothers who had not planned to, and who did not, breastfeed. Mothers who planned to breastfeed, but who did not go on to breastfeed, were over twice as likely to become depressed as mothers who had not planned to, and who did not, breastfeed.  This study shows that those mothers who want to breastfeed need lots of support. (“New Evidence on Breastfeeding and Postpartum Depression: The Importance of Understanding Women’s Intentions,” Maternal and Child Health Journal, online August 2014)

Infant-feeding practices and prevalence of diarrhea and acute respiratory infection (ARI) were obtained from 6,068 mother-child dyads in 11 provinces of Vietnam in 2011. The study found that early initiation of breastfeeding and exclusive breastfeeding protects against diarrhea and ARI.  Sadly, only 20% of the babies 0-5 months were exclusively breastfed. (International Breastfeeding Journal  2014, 9:12  doi:10.1186/1746-4358-9-12;1 August 2014)

Two studies in the Pediatrics journal support the benefits of breastfeeding.  Nine months or more of breastfeeding reduced the risk of ear infections by 31%, of throat infections by 32% and of sinus infections by 53% compared to children not breastfed for a long period of time. The study included 1300 children all aged six.  Another study also examined six year olds and found that those breastfed for four or more months had about half the odds of developing a food allergy compare to children who were breastfed for a shorter period of time. The team noted that breastfeeding did not reduce the risk of developing allergies in children from high-risk populations, such as families with a history of allergies.  (“Infant Feeding and Long-Term Outcomes: Results From the Year 6 Follow-Up of Children in the Infant Feeding Practices Study II”, pp-51-53 and “Infant Feeding Practices and Reported Food Allergies at 6 Years of Age”, pp. 521-528, Journal of Pediatrics Vol. 134 No. Supplement; 1 September, 2014)

Breastfeeding mothers may also lose weight!  Researchers tracked the weight of 726 women from pregnancy to six years after giving birth.  Obese women who followed the recommendations to nurse exclusively for the first six months and to breastfeed for at least 12 months experienced a weight loss of 18 pounds after pregnancy.  This was compared to obese mothers who never breastfed. (Journal of Pediatrics, online September 2, 2014)

Black breastfeeding mothers may lower their risk for aggressive breast cancer.  Parous women had a 33% higher risk for ER-negative breast cancer than those who had never given birth, and a 37% higher risk for triple-negative breast cancer. However, breast-feeding lowered the risk for both ER-negative and triple-negative disease.  For every age category in the United States, the incidence of triple-negative breast cancer is higher in black women than in non-Hispanic white women.  Black women have a lower prevalence of breastfeeding.  Hopefully, more black mothers will be encouraged to breastfeed.  (Journal of the National Cancer Institute, online September 15, 2014)

Breastfeeding adds to brain power.  “Researchers compared the fatty acid profiles of breast milk from women in over two dozen countries with how well children from those same countries performed on academic tests. Their findings show that the amount of omega-3 docosahexaenoic acid (DHA) in a mother’s milk is the strongest predictor of test performance. It outweighs national income and the number of dollars spent per pupil in schools.” (“Linoleic and docosahexaenoic acids in human milk have opposite relationships with cognitive test performance in a sample of 28 countries,” (Journal of Prostaglandins, Leukotrienes and Essential Fatty Acids, online September 2014)
Sheila: This study should really be publicized!

The study concludes that “bed-sharing is inappropriate if parents consume alcohol, take drugs or smoke, or if the infant is pre-term.”  Sofa-sharing is not a safe alternative.  The researchers conclude: “The risk of bed-sharing and SIDS in the absence of these hazardous conditions appears to be minimal; more effort therefore needs to go into advising parents on the very real dangers associated with bed-sharing in these particular hazardous conditions.”  (“Bed-Sharing in the Absence of Hazardous Circumstances,” September 19, 2014; DOI: 1371/journal.pone.0107799)
Sheila: Bed-sharing information is available at NFPI links.

Every year one million babies die on the day they are born.  Brazil wanted to tackle this problem because exclusively breastfed children are also 14 times less likely to die in the first six months compared to non-breastfed children.  In many low-income countries, only 39% of children under six months of age are exclusively breastfed.  Since 1985, Brazil started a breast milk donation campaign and has created the largest network of breast milk donors in the world.  “After testing, sorting and pasteurizing, donated milk is often used for infants whose mothers are sick or unable to breastfeed and in hospital neonatal intensive care units, where breast milk can be fed through a tube. With over 150,000 donors, over 155,000 recipients and 214 bank locations, Brazil has created the largest network of breast milk donors in the world.”  It is now estimated that “more than 50 percent of Brazilian mothers exclusively breastfeed for the child’s first month of life, a figure nearly 35 percent higher than the breastfeeding rate in the United States. The results are tangible. Since the campaign’s inception in 1985, Brazil’s infant mortality rate has plummeted by more than two-thirds, from 63.2 deaths per 1,000 births to 19.6 deaths per 1,000 births.” (Elisabeth Epstein, “Brazil’s Inventive Solution to Save Newborns: Breast Milk Banks.” Huffington Post, September 25, 2014)

Sheila Kippley
www.NFPandmore.org

Breastfeed for more than three months and you may protect your baby from inflammation and heart disease as a young adult!  Chronic inflammation, caused by a hyperactive immune system, has been linked to heart disease and strokes, Type-2 diabetes, late-life disability, and a greater risk of dying.  Researchers noted that higher blood levels of C-reactive protein (CRP) are a key biomarker for inflammation and predict increased cardiovascular and metabolic disease risk in adulthood.  The levels of CPR were evaluated in almost 7,000 young adults aged from 24 to 32. Their analysis showed that:  1) Lower birth weights and shorter duration of breastfeeding predicted higher CRP levels in young adults, 2) For each extra pound of birth weight, the CRP level in young adulthood was 5% lower, and 3) CPR levels were 20-30% lower in young adults who were breastfed for 3-12 months as babies compared to those who were never breastfed. (“Long-term effects of birth weight and breastfeeding duration on inflammation in early adulthood,”   Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences, online 23 April 2014)

Breastfeeding protects children from asthma according to researchers who studied the data from 117 scientific papers over 30 years and involving some 250,000 babies. Breastfeeding cuts the risk of asthma by 37 per cent in infants under three and by 17% for children aged seven and older. (“Breastfeeding and childhood asthma: systemic review and meta-analysis,” The American Journal of Epidemiology, May 15, 2014; 179 (10); 1153-67)

A fluoride study followed about 1000 persons up to the age of 38 from 1972-1973 in the town of Dunedin.  The study concluded that fluoridated water did not affect or lower one’s IQ.  However, the study found that breastfeeding was associated with a child’s high IQ. (“Community Water Fluoridation and Intelligence: Prospective Study in New Zealand” American Journal of Public Health, May 2014)

A medical researcher said exclusive breastfeeding of babies for six months could prevent them from developing cancer later in life.  Dr Bamidele Iwalokun of the Nigerian Institute of Medical Research said children denied exclusive breastfeeding in their first six months were prone to cancer.  Why?  Because Lactalbumin, found only in breast milk, is an anti-cancer agent and such a child is deprived of Lactalbumin.  Only about 17% of mothers breastfeed their babies exclusively.  The researcher said:  “Breast milk was the most complete form of nutrition for infants’ health, immunity and development. There is no better substitute than the breast milk for a child in the first six months of life. There is no infant formula that is better than breast milk because in the breast milk you have antibodies that will help defenceless infants to fight the war against diseases that challenge their lives.” (“Breastfeeding can prevent cancer,” Nigerian Tribrune, June 26, 2014)

No adverse effects on IQ could be seen from anti-epileptic drug exposure via breast milk at 6 years of age.  This study involved 181 children and found that “breastfed children exhibited higher IQ and enhanced verbal abilities,” according to the authors.  (JAMA Pediatrics, June 16, 2014)

Sheila Kippley
www.NFPandmore.org
PS:  I had to add this latest news.  This month at the Integrated Reproductive, Mother, Neonatal and Child Health Programme in Lahore, the capital city of Pakistani province of Punjab, it was reported that solid steps had been taken to reduce maternal mortality as well as child mortality up to age five years. Addressing the participants of the meeting, Health Director General Dr Zahid Pervaiz said that if mothers feed their babies for two years, the mortality rate in infants would be reduced as well as natural birth spacing and malnutrition problems would also be solved. He said that reasonable birth spacing could reduce the maternal mortality rate.  If anyone is interested in promoting natural child spacing through breastfeeding, please use the book The Seven Standards of Ecological Breastfeeding to send to others, those in the medical or missionary field.  It is a very short, inexpensive book and easy to read.

Introduction:  Last year I reviewed the breastfeeding research for 2013.  Following is a summary of some of the breastfeeding research of last year, 2014.  This research project was very time consuming; it appears more or less chronologically in this and the next three blogs.
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New research of over 7000 Chinese women found that those who breast-fed were about half as likely to develop rheumatoid arthritis compared to those who never breastfed. And the longer a woman breast-fed, the lower her risk of developing rheumatoid arthritis. (Rheumatology, January 6, 2014)

While breastfeeding provides many benefits to mother and baby and two years of breastfeeding is recommended, there has been a steady decline of breastfeeding in Saudi Arabia.  The duration of breastfeeding went from 13.4 months in 1987 to 8.5 months in 2010.  Initiation rates were high (over 90%) but the breastfeeding rates during the first hour of life were very poor.  The most common reason given for cessation of breastfeeding was insufficient breast milk.  (International Breastfeeding Journal, January 2014, 9:1)
Sheila: If mothers were taught the Seven Standards, the duration of breastfeeding would be much longer because frequent suckling stimulates the milk supply.

Breastfeeding mothers (210 mothers or 53%) who supplemented with formula in the hospital were more likely to reduce their nursings or to stop breastfeeding during the first 60 days after birth as opposed to those mothers (183 mothers or 47%) who exclusively breastfed in the hospital.  “The relative risks of not fully breastfeeding and ceasing breastfeeding increased significantly with number of in-hospital formula feeds.”  (Journal of Pediatrics, February 2014)

Breastfeeding can help to prevent cancer in children.  We know from the research that bottle-feeding increases the risk of cancer in children, such as lymphoma and leukemia.  Now an Israeli research concludes that breastfeeding decreases the chances of developing cancer by 60% compared to those children not breastfed. Dr. Keinan-Boker, a professor at the University of Haifa and deputy director of the Health Ministry’s Center for Disease Control, found that children exclusively breastfed up until four months were 40% less likely to develop cancer compared to those children breastfed less than four months. (Israel Cancer Association, February 12, 2014)

Breast milk promotes good bacteria in the gut.  Breastfeeding stimulates the development of helpful lactic acid bacteria in a newborn’s gut flora, which are advantageous to the growth of the child’s immune system. (Applied and Environmental Microbiology, February 2014)

Studies show that breastfed children perform better at school and have higher IQs, but one study sought to find out why breastfed babies are smarter.  A new study by Brigham Young University sociologists studied 7500 mothers and children from birth to five years of age.  They found that breastfeeding was associated with two motherly behaviors: responding to the child’s emotional cues and reading to the child starting at 9 months of age.  Children in the study who were breastfed for 6 months or longer performed the best on reading assessments because they also “experienced the most optimal parenting practices.”  (Journal of Pediatrics, March 2014)

Sheila Kippley
www.NFPandmore.org