50 Good Reasons to Breastfeed
Source : Pubdate : 2011/10/28 9:19:00 Author :
1. Individuals who have been breastfed maintain a lifetime advantage over those who have not.
2. Just one month of breastfeeding confers higher calcium retention in children's bones, which are then less likely to be subject to osteoporosis in later life.
3. Women who breastfeed are themselves less likely to develop osteoporosis in later life.
4. Just one month of breastfeeding has been shown to greatly improve the baby's immune responses to vaccination.
5. Individuals who have been breastfed are less prone to allergic illnesses.
6. Children who were breastfed have a lower incidence of cancer, especially lymphoma.
7. Postmortem studies done on children who died accidental deaths showed that the longer they had been breastfed the healthier were their major blood vessels.
8. Premature babies who were given tube-fed human milk for just the first month after birth have continued to maintain about 8 IQ points advantage over other premature babies who were not fed any human milk. These children are now over 7 years of age and are still being followed up by the researchers.
9. Premature babies who are fed human milk are far less subject to one of the major complications of prematurity – necrotising enterocolitis (death of a section of the bowel).
10. Artificial baby milks (formulae) are made from cow milk unless the label says otherwise.
11. It is impossible to make up an artificial milk (formula) feed without contaminating it with various microorganisms. Hence the need for great care with hygiene and storage of these feeds because they contain no antimicrobial agents to kill these potentially harmful microbes.
12. Formula is a perfect medium for bacteria to grow in, especially when warmed to feed a baby. Ideally formula feeds should be warmed for the baby just before he is fed, and consumed within 30 minutes to reduce the risk of gastrointestinal infections.
13. It is impossible to express breast milk without contaminating it with various micro-organisms. However, these will be kept within safe limits by the active antibacterial, antiviral, antifungal and antiparasitic properties of this milk.
14. Fresh human milk is actually cleaner of microbes several hours after being expressed than it was initially, because of the activity of white blood cells in the milk.
15. Fresh human milk can be stored in a clean covered container at room temperature for 8 hours before its microbial contamination levels make it unsafe to feed to the baby.
16. Ferret milk is actually much closer in composition to human milk than cow or goat milk.
17. The fear of AIDS has closed most of the world's human milk banks (previously used to feed very sick babies) but not our human sperm banks, even though pasteur
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