Catholic Church urged to help promote breastfeeding campaign

Posted By reynor | Filed Under News & Current Events

6/28/2007 Catholic Online (www.catholic.org)

MANILA, Philippines (Catholic Online) – The Catholic Church has an important role in play in promoting mothers’ return to breastfeeding in a Filipino society where milk substitutes have gained a stronghold due to aggressive advertising campaigns, said a United Nations official.

In a late June interview with the Catholic Bishops’ Conference of the Philippines, Dr. Shigeru Omi, director for the Western Pacific region for the World Health Organization, said “the church is still very influential in many societies and it could help our advocacy.”

The Catholic Church, he said, can inform families people that breastfeeding is “very, very effective in the health development of children not only biologically but also mentally,” as breastfeeding helps “develop the bond between mother and child.”

“The church through its priests and ministers can inform everyone in their congregation that breastfeeding is the most effective intervention to promote the healthy development of children,” he added.

In a related development, Stephen Atwood, UNICEF regional Health and Nutrition Adviser for East Asia and the Pacific, said the Philippines government has made only a very low government investment in health services, noting that it has allocated a mere percentage of the country’s Gross Domestic Product (GDP) on health.

“From 2000 to 2004 data, the Philippines is the third lowest in East Asia and the Pacific region, behind Myanmar and Indonesia,” he said, noting that, of the country’s national budget, “only 1 percent is allocated to health and 11 percent is allocated to education.”

Atwood added that “we’re not asking that you take the money from education to give it to health. We’re asking that the allocation for social services be increased so that health gets a larger part of the over-all budgetary pie.”

Both WHO and UNICEF recommend six months of exclusive breastfeeding for best infant growth, development and health.

However, most Filipina mothers breastfeed for less than 24 days on the average according to the 2003 National Demographic and Health Survey which showed a significant reduction from 1.4 months noted in the 1998 survey.

It has been reported that a child-mortality rate of 16,000 per year in the Philippines is largely due to inappropriate feeding.

UNICEF said a formula-fed infant is 14.2 times more likely to die of diarrhea than a breastfed infant.

World Health Organization said 430 million Philippine Pesos is spent yearly for hospitalization, health consultations and medicines for illnesses due to formula feeding. On top of all these, Filipino families spend an estimated amount of 21.5 billion pesos a year for infant formula, which require clean water and fuel for sterilization.

According to UNICEF, because of limited milk production in the Philippines, the country relies on milk imports to provide breast-milk substitutes.