Join us on Wednesday, 31 July 2024, at 2:00 p.m. (Washington DC, or EDT) to celebrate the start of World Breastfeeding Week with the webinar Closing the Gap: Breastfeeding Support for All. Breastfeeding support comes in many forms and takes place at many levels, starting in the community, where breastfeeding mothers and infants should be welcomed in local establishments, to a woman- and breastfeeding-friendly health care system. On the highest level, support also includes maternity protections from governments, to help protect the health and rights of women and babies.
Join us to celebrate breastfeeding mothers in all their diversity throughout their breastfeeding journeys and showcase the ways families, societies, communities, and health workers can support every breastfeeding mother.
How to participate
- DATE: Wednesday, June 31st, 2024
- TIME: 2:00 P.M. (EDT or Washington D.C. time) [check the local time in other cities at the end of this page]
- LANGUAGES: English, Spanish, and Portuguese with simultaneous translation.
- REGISTRATION: https://paho-org.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_UCiDuFhAQl6XU_Zf9IYVPA#/registration
Agenda
2:00 p.m. Welcome and opening remarks
2:05 p.m. Support for breastfeeding - Institution level
2:20 p.m. Support for breastfeeding - Community level
- Countries presentations
2:35 p.m. Milk banks supporting mothers
2:50 p.m. Supporting mothers in difficult circumstances
3:05 p.m. Training health workers to support mothers
3:20 p.m. Questions and answers
3:30 p.m. Closing remarks
Context
The many benefits of breastfeeding cannot be overemphasized. Breastfeeding protects children against morbidity and mortality due to infectious diseases. Breastfed children have higher intelligence scores than children breastfed for shorter periods or not breastfed. Breastfed children also have a lower risk of dental malocclusion, and there is evidence that breastfeeding protects against overweight and diabetes.
Mothers also benefit from breastfeeding their babies. Women who breastfeed have a lower risk of breast and ovarian cancer, improved birth spacing, and may also have a lower risk of diabetes and overweight/obesity.
Women everywhere have the right to respectful breastfeeding counseling from trained health care providers and laws and policies such as maternity leave and paid time off when they return to work.
The recommended actions to support women to breastfeed as long as they would like include:
- Community support for women to breastfeed anytime, anywhere, so that it is normalized in public life
- Effective maternity entitlements that do not force women to choose between their families and their work
- Trained health professionals who can provide helpful, respectful breastfeeding support
- An end to exploitative baby-milk promotions in all contexts
Time in other cities
- 11:00 a.m. – Los Angeles, Vancouver.
- 12:00 p.m. - Tegucigalpa, San Salvador, San Jose (CR), Mexico City, Managua, Guatemala City, Belmopan.
- 1:00 p.m. – Bogota, Panamá City, Kingston, Lima, Quito.
- 2:00 p.m. - Asunción, Bridgetown, Caracas, Georgetown, Havana, La Paz, Port of Spain, Port-au-Prince, Nassau, Ottawa, Santiago, San Juan, Santo Domingo, Caracas, Washington D.C.
- 7: 00 p.m. - London.
- 8:00 p.m. – Geneva, Madrid.
For other cities, check the local time in the following link.