Breastfeeding improves child’s mental health
Study by Neha Jindal - January 18, 2010             

Perth, Australia, -- A novel study has established that breastfeeding for a longer time can aid an infant’s mental health in the growing years.

The research team led by Associate Professor Wendy Oddy at the University of Western Australia has found that breastfeeding for 6 or more months can reduce the risk of mental health problems that a child may face in his or her teens.

The study showed that there were long lasting benefits from continued breastfeeding.

Study of data on 2366
The research team examined the data of the Western Australia Pregnancy Cohort study in which 2,366 children were studied. All the children from the age of two to 14 underwent a mental health measurement.

Researchers found that, out of the total children studied, 11 percent children were never breastfed, 38 percent were fed for less than 6 months and only about half of them were breastfed for 6 or more months.

When the research team evaluated the reasons of the score, they came to a conclusion that the mothers who fed their babies for a lesser time were either less educated or poor or had more stressful lives.

During the assessments, the team established a connection between duration of breastfeeding and behaviour of the child. They found out that with each successive month of breastfeeding, the behaviour score got better.

The score remained constant when socio-economic conditions influencing parenting were considered.

“Given the rising prevalence of mental health problems, interventions to assist mothers to breastfeed, and to breastfeed for longer, could be of long term benefit to the community,” said Oddy.

But, on the contrary, he also added, “As with any of these types of studies, it should be stressed that the findings do not mean that individual children that weren’t breastfed will have mental health problems, it’s about lowering the risk at a population level.”

Details of the study appear in the Journal of Pediatrics.

Health and breastfeeding
Louise Bugeja, a midwifery coordinator from Parent Craft within Mater Dei Hospital, a public hospital in Msida, Malta, said, “Breast milk is nature’s way to nurture and protect babies to ensure survival.”

She also added, “Breast milk was packed with antibodies and substances aimed at warding off diseases.”

Apart from benefits to the breastfed children, breastfeeding also proves healthy for the mother, as it cuts back the rate of heart disease, diabetes, high blood pressure, eczema, leukemia, asthma, and breast cancer in lactating mothers.

Breastfeeding has also been found to reduce the current obesity rate in children by slowing down the growth process.

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