U.S. Hospitals Hinder Black Women's Breastfeeding

[theHandpuppet]

http://womensenews.org/story/reproductive-health/140828/us-hospitals-hinder-black-womens-breastfeeding#.VAZBD01OWM8
U.S. Hospitals Hinder Black Women's Breastfeeding
By Juhie Bhatia
WeNews managing editor
Friday, August 29, 2014
The recent study finds that maternity centers may be part of the reason behind the country's racial breastfeeding gap. A film released this week, in honor of Black Breastfeeding Week, is aimed at changing the trend.

NEW YORK (WOMENSENEWS)--Maternity services at hospitals in neighborhoods with more African Americans are doing less to promote breastfeeding, possibly contributing to the breastfeeding disparity between black and white women, finds a study released last week.

Despite the many well documented health benefits of breastfeeding for the mother and child, including lowering a woman's risk of breast and ovarian cancers and diabetes, hospitals serving African American communities have been slow to adapt practices to support new mothers to start breastfeeding. Initiation of breastfeeding and breastfeeding duration rates for black infants in the United States are about 16 percent lower than for white babies.

"Although the reasons for these disparities are unclear, the results might provide some insight into why there has been a persistent gap in breastfeeding initiation and duration rates between black and white infants in the United States," said the authors in the study.

The study, published last week by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, found that in neighborhoods where the black population is higher than average (above 12.2 percent) key practices that support breastfeeding are much less common. The biggest difference in practices included hospital efforts to initiate early breastfeeding, limited use of infant formula and rooming-in (keeping the mother and baby in the same room).... MORE at link provided above.

[polly7]

1. Boggles the mind.

I honestly do not understand this. Having worked in hospitals, it was just common practice to encourage breast feeding for every baby. Seriously, I'm confused over the reason for this.