Friday 11 December 2015
Monday 23 November 2015
Thursday 10 September 2015
Monday 24 August 2015
‘I wish I could give breast milk to all the babies who need it”
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| Donor mom, Lungile Kubheka
Photo: Wendy Khumalo
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August 7
Madadeni: Eighteen-year-old Lungile Kubheka’s daughter was born at only 30
weeks but the upside of this, she says, was that it gave her the opportunity to
help other needy babies.
Lungile’s baby has been in the Intensive Care Unit at
Newcastle Hospital since she was born two weeks ago. “I thank God because if she
wasn’t premature, I wouldn’t have been stuck in the hospital and had the chance
to donate my breast milk.” Lungile, who comes from a farm in Manzama, KwaZulu Natal,
finished matric last year. After giving birth, she was told about the Human
Milk Bank at the hospital. She jumped at the chance to donate. “I wanted to
help babies that don’t have mothers and the kids whose mothers don’t have
milk.” Lungile explains the process: “They tested me for HIV and
then they gave me a donor number. I wash my hands and I take the cup and express
my milk into it. Then I close the cup and I write my name and my donor number
on some tape and put it on the cup. Then I put the cup in the fridge.”
Even though her baby is tiny, “she is doing fine”.
“Every hour and thirty minutes I go and see her. I feed her my
expressed milk with a tube. I know how good breast milk so that is why I want
every baby to have it.
“The good thing is that the more milk you express, the more
you produce. So you don’t have to worry about whether your baby won’t get
enough.
“I wish I could give breast milk to all babies who need it.”
Taking the message to the community
August 7
Madadeni: Breastfeeding Week 2015 was celebrated in the Amajuba
district in north-west KwaZulu Natal with a lively community event aimed at
raising awareness of the importance of exclusive breastfeeding and of the
implementation of the Human Milk Bank at Newcastle Hospital.
“The broader goal is
to reduce child malnutrition and mortality,” explained Ms Sindisiwe Mchunu,
nutrition co-ordinator of Amajuba District.
“The rate of breastfeeding after delivery is very high – 90%
and above - but after discharge from hospital, most mothers are not practicing
exclusive breastfeeding and that is our challenge,” said Ms Mchnu. “The rate of
exclusive breastfeeding is very low: only 8%. This has contributed to high
rates of malnutrition in our district.
“Last year (2014/2015), the number of admissions for severe
acute malnutrition was above 200, compared to 155 in 2013/2014. So every year,
there is an increase.
“If we get 200 coming to hospital, how many more are there
in the communities? We see children as young as two months with malnutrition.
We think that if we get breastfeeding right, we can get that right.”
The event was attended by around 300 men and women of all
ages. This was deliberate, explained Ms
Mchunu, as care is often shared by members of the family.
“We had focus group discussions last year which showed that
when mothers have to go back to work or to school, that is when exclusive
breastfeeding stops. We need to target not just the mother but the community as
a whole. This means gogos and mkhulus.”
Ms Lungile Kubheka, an 18-year-old donor mother, gave a
moving account of how she is donating her breastmilk to the Human Milk Bank at
Newcastle Hospital.
Short dramas enacted by Mixed Media showing the everyday
obstacles encountered by nursing mothers had the audience in fits of
laughter. Umbrellas, baby beanies and
cooler bags with the pink and white Made by Mom branding were distributed to
those who correctly answered questions about the importance of exclusive
breastfeeding and human milk banking.
In a room at the back of the hall, nurses from the Newcastle
Hospital offered a full range of community services including immunization and
growth monitoring for children; screening for HIV, diabetes and hypertension as
well as family planning.
“When we get people together like this, we use the
opportunity to provide every service we possibly can,” explained Ms Mchunu.
Friday 31 July 2015
BREASTFEEDING WEEK 2015
Tomorrow marks the start of Breastfeeding Week. New evidence shows that adults who were breast-fed as babies turn out smarter, better educated and richer. And from Kenya, more good news: exclusive breastfeeding has increased nearly four-fold in the past 12 years.
Read more
Read more
Breast really is best
FOUR extra points of IQ, an extra year’s education and a significantly enhanced income at the age of 30. Those are the benefits of having been breast-fed, according to a study just published in Lancet Global Health by Bernardo Horta of the Federal University of Pelotas, in Brazil, and his colleagues. Other research has suggested that breast-feeding has beneficial long-term effects. But Dr Horta’s is particularly persuasive because it looks at adults rather than children and teenagers, and because it contradicts the suggestion that social class is a confounding variable, with rich mothers tending to breast-feed more than poor mothers do.Read more
What Kenya did right
KENYA has seen a remarkable growth in exclusive breastfeeding for children under six months old. In 2003, only 13% of mothers were breastfeeding exclusively. This year, according to the National Demographic and Health Survey, 61% of mothers of children aged less than six months were breastfeeding exclusively.Read more
Thursday 30 July 2015
Monday 6 July 2015
Thursday 4 June 2015
"I was told not to breastfeed in public"
"I've just been told by a staff member at Medicross Rustenburg to not breastfeed my daughter outside the doctor's room..." Read more »
Tuesday 26 May 2015
“My breast milk was feeding 26 babies”
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| Donor mom, Khanyi Nzama
Khanyi Nzama estimates
that, for an hour a day last year, she was breastfeeding 26 babies. Every day,
she expressed 260mls of breast milk into a bottle and delivered it to the local
Human Milk Bank. “I went to the hospital
and I saw how some of these sick babies took 10mls in two hours. So I was not
only feeding my own baby, I was also helping to feed another 26 children.”
Khanyi’s baby, Fezile,
is now three and no longer breastfeeding so Khanyi directs her efforts at persuading other
mothers to donate their milk.
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Khanyi, 32, lives in
Marianhill outside Durban, in a poor community. A quietly spoken mother of two, she is
motivated by a desire to help others. “Most of the mothers are unemployed and
live on social grants. Many are very young and are single parents. Some say
they are starving and can’t feed. The kids look malnourished.”
When Fezile was born,
the nurses encouraged Khanyi to breastfeed. This went against tradition in her
community where breastfeeding is often stigmatised because it is associated
with poverty.
“In our culture,” she
says, “You don’t breastfeed because you say your husband can afford formula. Or because your mother or mother-in-law wants
to feed your baby other things.”
She encountered
hostility when she insisted on breastfeeding Fezile after rearing her
first-born on formula: “I saw how healthy and pretty my baby looked,” says
Khanyi, “So I wanted to continue. But
they were cross: my mother-in-law used to say: ‘This makoti (daughter-in-law) is
so rude. She is not listening to me.’ My
mother-in-law wanted to feed the baby tea and water and porridge.
“My mother said: ‘We
raised you on formula milk.’ So everybody was against me.”
But Khanyi persisted,
exclusively breastfeeding her daughter for six months and then combining breastfeeding
with solids until Fezile was two years and two months old.
While giving birth in
hospital, she had heard about the donor breast milk programme and, troubled by
the suffering around her, she decided to sign up for it. “I had heard about how breast milk provided
so many nutrients as well as the baby’s first immunization and I realized that
I could give it not only to my own baby but also to babies whose mothers are
sick. Other people come with toys but if I come with breast milk, I am giving
them so much more.
“At first I could give
only 130mls a day but the more you breastfeed, the more milk you produce and later
I was giving 260mls a day.
“I see these sick children
lying there and I think: this is the future generation and we mothers can save
them. I want to encourage all
mothers to breastfeed and to donate milk.”
Issued by Community Media Trust
KZN launches Human Milk Banks
Far too few South African women practice exclusive breastfeeding and,
as a result, far too many children are dying. Only just over 8% of South
African women feed their babies breast milk only for the first six months of their
lives although research shows that exclusive breast feeding is the best
possible start they can give them in life.
A study in 2009 showed that 62 out of 1000 South African children had
died before they reached the age of five and this figure had not changed since
1999 despite the huge improvements that democracy had brought in the form of
housing, piped water, health facilities and social grants. In some 34% of premature
deaths, malnutrition was the underlying cause.
In KwaZulu Natal, another study in 2012 showed infant mortality down
to 42 per 1000 live births. This year, the figure was further reduced to 31
infant deaths per 1000. This is still
too high. The Millennium Development Goals set by the United Nations in 2000
stipulate that there should be fewer than 20 deaths per 1000 by 2015.
In an attempt to reach this goal, the KwaZulu Natal Department of
Health, in partnership with the University of KwaZulu Natal, is encouraging all
women to breastfeed exclusively for six months. It is an ambitious initiative
and includes the establishment of human milk banks throughout the province so
that orphaned and premature babies and those with mothers too sick to breastfeed
can also benefit. A call has gone out to healthy mothers to donate their breast
milk.
Ms Leonore Spies, Director of the Integrated Nutrition Programme at
the KZN Department of Health, explains: “In South Africa, what most children
die of is respiratory tract infections but the underlying reason is malnutrition. Exclusive breastfeeding is the single most
important thing you can do for your child. Most South African mothers don’t
breastfeed for long. About 90% start breastfeeding in hospital but they don’t sustain
it. The culture is mixed feeding: you get breast milk combined with formula,
tea and water.
“Breast milk provides immunity and protection. If babies do get an
infection, it won’t be as bad and they will get better more quickly.”
Since anti-retroviral medication became freely available, HIV
positive mothers no longer need fear passing on the virus to their babies and
formula milk is no longer supplied by the state.
Professor Anna Coutsoudis from the Department of Paediatrics at UKZN
explains why breast milk is so good for babies: “It protects them both from short-term
illness and adverse health outcomes later in life. In formula-fed infants,
there is an increased incidence of gastroenteritis, pneumonia, otitis media,
and asthma. Breastfed children are also less likely to experience
childhood leukemias, type I and type II diabetes, and obesity compared to those
who are formula fed. Breast milk is especially important for premature infants
as it reduces the risk of a disease of the intestine known as necrotizing enterocolitis
which carries a risk of mortality and poor quality of life for survivors.”
The Minister of Health, Aaron Motsaoledi, has called for Human Milk
Banks to be set up throughout the country. KwaZuluNatal has led the way, with
five Human Milk Banks already up and running and another six to be opened soon.
They are run according to internationally accepted guidelines in order to
ensure the safety of vulnerable babies.
Potential donors undergo a health screening. They are then given sterile
jars into which their milk is expressed. The milk is tested, pasteurized and
frozen, ready to be supplied to babies in need.
The Human Milk Banks act as central processing banks. Clinics and
hospital forward donated breast milk to them so that it can be pasteurized and
frozen.
So far, Human Milk
Banks have been established at:
Stanger Hospital, Stanger
King Edward VIII Hospital, Congella
Greys Hospital, Pietermartizburg and Edendale Hospital, Edendale
Newcastle Hospital, Newcastle
Lower Umfolozi Mother and Children’s Hospital, Empangeni
A further six will
be established at:
Port Shepstone Hospital, Port Shepstone
Ladysmith Hospital, Ladysmith
Dundee Hospital, Dundee
Nkonjeni Hospital, Mahlabathini
Bethesda Hospital, Umbombo
Christ the King Hospital, Ixopo
In addition,
another five smaller Human Milk Banks with small pasteurising units will be set
up in the next six months. They will be at:
RK Khan Hospital, Chatsworth
Mahatma Gandhi Hospital, Edgecombe
Addington Hospital, Durban
GJ Crookes Hospital, Scottburgh
Murchison Hospital, Port Shepstone
To find out more about the Human Milk Banks in public hospitals
please contact Mrs Ronel Sorgenfrei from the KZN Department of Health on
Milk banks run by
other organisations include:
iThemba Lethu, a community based milk bank. Contact: Joelle Gibson
on
Human Milk Banking Association: hmbasa.org.za
In Gauteng, South African Breastmilk Reserve: sabr.org.za
In Cape Town, Milk Matters: milkmatters.org.za
In Kloof, KZN, the National Road Pharmacy acts as a depot for
screening donors and collecting and storing breast milk. Contact is: Cindy
Bradley at clinic@nationalroadpharm.co.za or 031
764 0311
Issued by Community Media Trust
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