By Editorial,
Experts attending an event to mark World Breastfeeding Week in Kampala have urged the government to set up human milk banks at public hospitals, noting that babies are unnecessarily being initiated on milk supplements too early, affecting their survival and health outcomes later in life.
Ms. Laura Ahumuza, a Senior Nutritionist at the Ministry of Health, said at the meeting today that while Uganda generally has good indicators with 81 per cent of the babies being initiated on breast milk in the first hour after birth, vulnerable babies with complications are often fed on supplements through nasogastric tubes.
Citing Kawempe National Referral Hospital, Ahumuza said premature babies and neonates admitted in the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit are often fed on formula whenever they can’t access milk from their mothers.
Calling for prioritizing, having a breast milk bank at the hospital, the nutritionist said the facility had the highest rate of low birth weight and neonatal mortality at 53 per cent last year, followed by Mulago Women and Neonatal and Moroto hospitals. Ms. Ahumuza speaking…
She said some of these deaths are partly due to feeding, and yet donated breast milk can be an option for survival. End.