Blessing Taiwo
The United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) has urged employers, clerics, health workers and families to actively support nursing mothers for exclusive breastfeeding.
In a message to mark World Breastfeeding Week observed annually from August 1 to 7, Celine Lafoucriere, Chief of UNICEF Field Office in Lagos for Southwest Nigeria, stressed the importance of exclusive breastfeeding for six full months.
Lafoucriere maintained that breastmilk is the baby’s first vaccine which protects against sickness and builds a stronger brain.
Affirming that Nigerian mothers breastfeed their babies, she pointed out that only a few do it correctly.
“Across Nigeria, most mothers breastfeed. But too few do it the right way. Only one in three babies are put to the breast within the first hour of birth.
“Only three in ten babies are exclusively breastfed for six full months, no water, no formula, no solid food, just breastmilk alone.
“In southwest Nigeria, with our hospitals, our markets, our busy working mothers, we can change that number,” Lafoucriere said.
She urged employers to give their staff members, who are nursing mothers, the time and space to properly breastfeed their babies.
Also, she charged health workers to place the baby to the breast within the first hour after delivery.
Her words: “My message is simple. To every employer, give your staff the break and the privacy breastfeeding needs.
“To every health worker, put that baby to the breast within the first hour, every time. To every family member, support her, don’t second-guess her.
“She needs her own mother, her husband, her mother -in-law, her pastor, her imam, standing behind her, not questioning her.”
Encouraging nursing mothers to keep on breastfeeding, Lafoucriere said, “every mother in Lagos feeding her child right now, alone in the quiet hours of the night, we see you. You are giving your child their first and best gift. UNICEF, her partners and your government stand with you.”
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