L-G highlights importance of breastfeeding

‘Mother’s milk has several unique health-promoting and protective properties’

Lt. Governor Tamilisai Soundararajan on Sunday appealed to all mothers to breastfeed their newborns as the mother’s milk had several unique health-promoting and protective properties for the parent and the child. In a public message during the launch of World Breastfeeding Week, Ms. Soundararajan urged mothers to breastfeed the newborn within the first hour of delivery, adopt exclusive breastfeeding for a period of six months and include it in the child’s diet for about two years thence. The World Health Organisation (WHO) and the United Nations Children’s Emergency Fund (UNICEF), while recommending early initiation of breastfeeding within the first hour of birth and exclusive breastfeeding for the first six months, have advised breastfeeding for up to two years of age or beyond, alongside the introduction of nutritionally adequate and safe complementary solid foods at six months.