Join us, on August 3rd, to celebrate World Breastfeeding Week. The webinar will focus on enabling breastfeeding in the workplace. The World Health Organization recommends that babies should be exclusively breastfed for the first six months of life, followed by the introduction of nutritionally adequate and safe complementary foods, and with continued breastfeeding up to two years old or beyond. Supporting working parents to follow these recommendations requires:
- Adequate maternity leave – a minimum of 18 weeks and ideally more than 6 months;
- A breastfeeding room with accommodation for breastfeeding as well as expression and storage of breastmilk at the workplace; and,
- Reduced hours or flexible schedule while breastfeeding.
Recording
- DATE: Thursday, 3 August, 2023
- TIME: 11:00 am - 12:30 pm
- REGISTER: https://paho-org.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_J6oaUVv2Q4OaHi_mKnPj0w#/registration
- The Zoom room has capacity for 500 people simultaneously. For those who are not able to join live, the recording will be made available in this page after the webinar.
- LANGUAGES: English, Spanish and Portuguese, with simultaneous interpretation in all languages.
Background
World Breastfeeding Week (WBW) is celebrated annually from 1 to 7 August. It is a global campaign coordinated by the World Alliance for Breastfeeding Action (WABA) to raise awareness and galvanize action on themes related to breastfeeding. WBW commemorates the signing of the Innocenti Declaration in August 1990, when government policymakers, the World Health Organization (WHO), UNICEF, and other organizations pledged to protect, promote and support breastfeeding.
This year, PAHO’s campaign theme is Let’s Make Breastfeeding and Work, Work! During the week, PAHO will promote maternity rights that support breastfeeding, so that women can be accommodated to breastfeed as long as they want to.
Maternity leave - Breastfeeding room - Reduced hours and flexible time
Agenda
11:00 AM Welcome and opening remarks - Leo Nederveen, Acting Unit Chief, Risk Factors and Nutrition Department of Noncommunicable Diseases and Mental Health (NMH)
11:05 AM Presentations
- Maternity Rights for Breastfeeding Women - Ignacio Ibarra, DHE
- Breastfeeding In the PAHO Region - Audrey Morris, NMH/RF
11:35 AM Experiences from the field
- Countries presentations.
- Dra. Luz Angela Ochoa, Ministry of Health and Social Protection, Colombia.
- Sra. Macarena Alejandra Moya Inzunza, Ministry of Health, Chile
- Support for Advocacy, the role of NGOs -
- Dr Alison Bernard, Breastfeeding and Child Nutrition Foundation (BCNF) Barbados and Healthy Caribbean Coalition (HCC)
12:15 PM Questions and Answers
12:25 PM Closing remarks - Leo Nederveen, Acting Unit Chief, Risk Factors and Nutrition Department of Noncommunicable Diseases and Mental Health (NMH)
Time in other cities
- 8:00 am. – Vancouver, Los Angeles.
- 9:00 am. – Guatemala City, Mexico City, San Jose (CR), Tegucigalpa, San Salvador.
- 10:00 am. – Bogota, Panama City, Kingston, Quito, Lima.
- 11:00 am. – Washington DC, Asunción, Caracas, Havana, La Paz, Santiago de Chile, Santo Domingo, Ottawa, Port-au-Prince, San Juan, Santo Domingo, Bridgetown, Nassau.
- 12:00 pm. – Buenos Aires, São Paulo, Montevideo, Brasilia, Paramaribo.
- 5:00 pm. – Geneva, Madrid.
For other cities, check the local time in the following link.
World Breastfeeding Week
World Breastfeeding Week is held in the first week of August every year, supported by WHO, UNICEF and many Ministries of Health and civil society partners.
This year’s theme will focus on breastfeeding and work, providing a strategic opportunity to advocate for essential maternity rights that support breastfeeding – maternity leave for a minimum of 18 weeks, ideally more than 6 months, and workplace accommodations after this point.
These are urgent issues for ensuring women can breastfeed as long as they wish to do so: more than half a billion working women are not given basic maternity provisions; many more find themselves unsupported when they go back to work.