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INNOCENTI DECLARATION
On the Protection, Promotion
and Support of Breastfeeding.
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Recognising that:
Breastfeeding is a unique process
that:
Provides ideal nutrition for infants and contributes to
their healthy growth and development Reduces incidence and severity
of infectious diseases, thereby lowering infant morbidity and mortality
Contributes to women's health by reducing the risk of breast and ovarian
cancer, and by increasing the spacing between pregnancies Provides social
and economic benefits to the family and the nation Provides most women
with a sense of satisfaction when successfully carried out
and that Recent Research
has found that: these benefits increase with increased
exclusiveness of breastfeeding during the first six months of life,
and thereafter with increased duration of breastfeeding with complementary
foods, and programme intervention can result in positive changes in
breastfeeding behaviour
We therefore declare that:
As a global goal for optimal maternal and child health and nutrition,
all women should be enabled to practise exclusive breastfeeding and
all infants should be fed exclusively on breastmilk from birth to
4-6 months of age. Thereafter, children should continue to be breastfed,
while receiving appropriate and adequate complementary foods, for
up to two years of age or beyond. This child-feeding ideal is to be
achieved by creating an appropriate environment of awareness and support
so that women can breastfeed in this manner.
Attainment of this goal requires, in many countries, the reinforcement
of a "breastfeeding culture" and its vigorous defence against incursions
of a "bottle-feeding culture". This requires commitment and advocacy
for social mobilization, utilizing to the full the prestige and authority
of acknowledged leaders of society in all walks of life.
Efforts should be made to increase women's confidence in their ability
to breastfeed. Such empowerment involves the removal of constraints
and influences that manipulate perceptions and behaviour towards breastfeeding,
often by subtle and indirect means. This requires sensitivity, continued
vigilance, and a responsive and comprehensive communications strategy
involving all media and addressed to all levels of society. Furthermore,
obstacles to breastfeeding within the health system, the workplace
and the community must be eliminated.
Measures should be taken to ensure that women are adequately nourished
for their optimal health and that of their families. Furthermore,
ensuring that all women also have access to family planning information
and services allows them to sustain breastfeeding and avoid shortened
birth intervals that may compromise their health and nutritional status,
and that of their children.
All governments should develop national breastfeeding policies and
set appropriate national targets for the 1990s. They should establish
a national system for monitoring the attainment of their targets,
and they should develop indicators such as the prevalence of exclusively
breastfed infants at discharge from maternity services, and the prevalence
of exclusively breastfed infants at four months of age.
National authorities are further urged to integrate their breastfeeding
policies into their overall health and development policies. In so
doing they should reinforce all actions that protect, promote and
support breastfeeding within complementary programmes such as prenatal
and perinatal care, nutrition, family planning services, and prevention
and treatment of common maternal and childhood diseases. All healthcare
staff should be trained in the skills necessary to implement these
breastfeeding policies.
Operational Targets
All governments by the year 1995 should have: Appointed
a national breastfeeding coordinator of appropriate authority, and established
a multisectoral national breastfeeding committee composed of representatives
from relevant government departments, non-governmental organizations,
and health professional associations
Ensured that every facility providing maternity services fully practises
all ten of the Ten Steps to Successful Breastfeeding set out in the
joint WHO/UNICEF statement "Protecting, promoting and supporting breastfeeding:
the special role of maternity services".
Taken action to give effect to the principles and aim of all Articles
of the International Code of Marketing of Breast-Milk Substitutes
and subsequent relevant World Health Assembly resolutions in their
entirety;
and enacted imaginative legislation protecting the breastfeeding
rights of working women and established means for its enforcement
We also call upon international organizations
to:
Draw up action strategies for protecting, promoting and supporting
breastfeeding, including global monitoring and evaluation of their
strategies
Support national situation analyses and surveys and the development
of national goals and targets for action;
and Encourage and support national authorities in planning, implementing,
monitoring and evaluating their breastfeeding policies
The Innocenti Declaration was produced and adopted by participants
at the WHO/UNICEF policymakers' meeting on "Breastfeeding in the 1990s:
A Global Initiative, co-sponsored by the United States Agency for International
Development (A.I.D.) and the Swedish International Development Authority
(SIDA), held at the Spedale degli Innocenti, Florence, Italy, on 30
July - 1 August 1990. The Declaration reflects the content of the original
background document for the meeting and the views expressed in group
and plenary sessions.
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