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Husbands play key role in breastfeeding: Expert
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For a healthier generation – Hundreds of mothers participate in a mass breastfeeding event held by the Indonesian World Record Museum (MURI) to celebrate Mother’s Day at the Satria Sports Stadium in Purwokerto, Central Java, on Dec. 22, 2013. (Tempo/Aris Andrianto)
An expert has said that husbands play a pivotal role in their wives’ ability to produce breast milk after childbirth.
“A husband should make his wife feel comfortable and relaxed during breastfeeding, because stress will lead to breastfeeding problems, hampering the production and flow of his wife’s breast milk,” Indonesian Lactation Center chairwoman Utami Roesli said on Saturday.
She added that husbands could do simple things to help their wives relax, such as helping to bath the baby or changing its diapers. Taking care of the baby was not the sole responsibility of the mother, she went on.
Utami noted that babies should be exclusively breastfed up to the age of six months and that breastfeeding could continue until the baby was two years of age.
Health Minister Nila F. Moeloek previously said that the rate of exclusively breastfed baby’s in Indonesia had risen to 65 percent, up from 42 percent in 2013 and just 32 percent in 2007.
The ministry found that a lack of breastfeeding contributed to malnutrition, with more than 37 percent of children under the age of 5 chronically malnourished and experiencing stunted growth in 2013. Failure to exclusively breastfeed newborns also contributes to child mortality, according to the ministry. (wnd/ebf)
