IS breastfeeding, one of Nigeria’s most treasured value systems, gradually losing signifcance? It is undisputable fact that breast milk has no substitute hence breast feeding is the only practical parenting skill that offers the child subsistence and emotional development.

But for some time now, mothers have been found wanting in their responsibility towards their newborns and babies as they have not been indulging in the natural act of breast feeding which is essential for adequate early childhood care.

Data from the World Health Organisation, WHO, show that Nigeria’s breastfeeding rate has gradually dropped from 80 percent in the 1970s and 1980s to as low as 15 per cent today.

On this year’s World Breastfeeding Week, CHIOMA OBINNA sought views of key stakeholders as to why Nigerian women should go back to the age-long act of breastfeeding. Excerpts:

We should not deprive our children of their inherent right — Dr. Yewande Adeshina, Special Adviser on Public Health to Gov Fashola

There is nothing wrong with breastfeeding.  It does not cause breast sagging. A 60-year-old that never had a child will have sagging breast. It is natural, it is aging and there is nothing anyone can do about it short of plastic surgery. We shouldn’t deprive our children their inherent right to a healthy start in their lives by denying them the breast milk.

When we were younger, breast milk was the in thing but modernisation has caused us to veer away from that. Breastfeeding reduces medical cost, the children are less sick. So we spend less, the mothers are happier because the children are healthier.  The productivity at work and in family responsibilities is improved.   When the children are grown, you have more productive members of the society that provide for the revenue of the state.   So it behoves  the state and nation to invest properly at an early so that they can reap the rewards of their investment in the future.

Many women complain about social constraints. They are embarrassed to bring out the breast to nurse in public because they think it is a low social and common class act.  You won’t find a grass roots person embarrassed with breast feeding. Most of the people that have challenge are in the middle and upper class because there is a social status women are trying to protect.

I am here to encourage them that there are many ways to breastfeed in public without exposing the breast.  Our men should also understand that women breastfeeding in public is not an advertisement. Our women need to get away from vanity and look at the investment in the health of their children for the future after all the children will take care of us in our old age, and if we don’t give the right nourishment and environment to grow we may not be able to get the dividends of our investment from pregnancy into adulthood.

Every mother should see breast feeding as mandatory — Mrs. Lola Alonge, Director, Child Health Advocacy Initiative

When we talk about the Rights of the child to which Nigeria is signatory, which of them is the Right to life? One of the ways you can give a child the right to life is to breast feed that child so the child will survive.  That is why it is said that mothers should breast feed exclusively for six months.  Mothers should see breastfeeding as the right of the child and the best gift you can give to the child.

So every mother should see it as mandatory that they need to breastfeed exclusively for six months. For career mothers, looking at the other challenges they are going through and how they can get over it, this can be taken care of by expressing the milk or taking the baby along with you just for the six months.

Devote time to breastfeed your child. You can keep the milk for seven hours without putting it in the refrigerator. Breast milk can last up to three months when frozen. In the US, they do that but in Nigeria we are not looking at 24 hours campaign. The rule is feed on demand and feed at least 10 times within 24 hours. Breast feeding is an investment no mother should afford to miss. You will be surprised what that investment is going to yield in the future. That child is going to be intelligent, bond more with you and save more money for the family, the benefits are enormous.

Employers of labour also need to know that it is the right of the child and assist the mothers to breast feed the child for six months.

Many things can wait, but not children — Dr. Bunmi Ogundimu, Executive Director, Colostrum International

According to Gabriella Mistral, “we are guilty of many errors and faults but our worst crime is abandoning the children and neglecting the foundation of life.  Many things we need can wait. The children cannot. Right now, is the time his bones are being formed and his senses being developed, to him we cannot answer tomorrow. His name is today.

The mental and emotional stability produced through bonding is the basis of value systems of each society or culture. The first child’s school is the mother’s chest which runs for about 36 months of life.  Breast milk provides both adequate and proper nutrition for the baby is not only specie – specific, it is also produced to meet the specific needs of each child at any particular time.

Fathers should also encourage their women to breastfeed and that is why we are advocating six months maternity leave for women and two weeks paternity leave for fathers to ensure complete survival of the child. If Nigerian women should practice breastfeeding consistently and conscientiously, our identity will begin to speak more of “ours, yours and theirs”; rather than the present “me, myself and mine.”  Then the Nigeria of the future will emerge where the truth and justice will reign.