Mums encouraged to breast-feed

Source: Viet Nam News,
August, 04 2010

by Thanh Hai

A recent survey conducted by the Ministry of Health revealed that just 10 per cent of mothers in Viet Nam breast-feed their babies for the first six months of their lives, compared to a global rate of 32 per cent.

Meanwhile, in Cambodia, where health and economic standards are lower than in Viet Nam, about 65 per cent of mothers exclusively breast feed their babies for the first six months of their lives.

Hoang Dieu Hang, 25, who works for Ha Noi Securities Exchange, said she found it difficult to hold down a job and be a full-time mother at the same time.

"How am I meant to breast feed my baby for the first six months of her life when legally I'm only allowed four months maternity leave," Hang said.

The ministry calculates that 20-30 per cent of all new mothers have to return to work within four months of giving birth.

Dinh Thi Phuong Hoa, deputy director of the Reproductive Health Department, said insufficient maternity leave was a major deterrent to new mothers who wanted to properly breast-feed their babies.

Hoa said maternity leave should be extended to six months to allow mothers to properly breast-feed their children.

Hang said she often gave her baby fruit juice or water when not breast feeding her child – despite the fact that doctors recommend that new born babies be given nothing but human milk for the first six months of their lives.

"Doctors and health staff at the obstetrics hospital did not tell me that it was important to exclusively breast feed my child for the first six months," Hang said.

"I've leant all I know about nursing my baby from my mother, friends and the mass media – not health staff," she said.

Hoa said that the vast majority of medical workers in Viet Nam were unaware of the importance of breast feeding a new-born baby.

"Health staff rarely advise mothers that they should breast feed their babies one hour after giving birth, and that they should continue to do so for the first six months of the baby's life. Ideally, they should continue to breast feed their babies for the next two years," Hoa said.

Despite official guidelines, it is reported that medical staff at one in three health care units encourage the use of bottles for feeding infants. It is also reported that powdered milk is routinely advertised at health care centres and paediatric departments where formula milk is prohibited.

Medical experts say that feeding a new-born infant breast milk yields enormous benefits. It is claimed that 13 per cent of deaths of under-five-year-olds could be prevented if infants were fed breast milk. Allergies, hypertension, diabetes, obesity, cardiovascular diseases and cancer are also linked to non-breast milk alternatives, said Jean Dupraz, from the United Nations Fund for Children (UNICEF)'s Acting Representative in Viet Nam.

A programme called Baby Friendly Hospital Initiative was launched in 1992 to encourage mothers in Viet Nam to breast feed their youngsters.

Last week, the Ministry of Health, UNICEF and Alive and Thrive, which is funded by the Bill&Melinda Gates Foundation, launched a campaign to promote breast feeding on the occasion of World Breast Feeding Week.

Despite the campaign, just 59 out of 12,146 hospitals and health centres in the country offering maternal services are certified as "Baby Friendly Hospitals."

Viet Nam has set itself the goal of having 50 per cent of all new-borns breast fed for the first six months of their lives by 2015. If that target is not achieved, among other things, it is claimed that Viet Nam would at the very least fail to achieve its Millennium Development Goals. — VNS