Breastfeeding offers nutritional, immunological, developmental, psychological and health benefits to infants and children. In fact, no other food beats breast milk as the best form of nutrition for infants. Breast milk has anti-infective properties owing to the presence of antibodies that are very beneficial in protecting infants from infectious organisms, illnesses and even Sudden Infant Death Syndrome (SIDS).
Even though several infant nutrition formulas are also beneficial to an extent, they cannot compare to the chemical, nutritional, hormonal or cellular makeup of breast milk. Given that breastfeeding is a normal and healthy lifestyle that is beneficial to both the mother and the infant, it is important that some of the benefits be expounded on. Colostrum, one of the major constituents of milk contains antibodies which offer immunity against various infections.
This explains why breast fed babies have lower incidences of ear infections, diarrhea, stomach viruses, respiratory infections, atopic dermatitis, obesity, asthma, type 1 and type 2 diabetes, Sudden infant death syndrome (SIDS), childhood leukemia, chrohn's disease and necrotizing enterocolitis. Since the infants nutritional needs are always changing, breast milk meets these needs by constantly modifying the concentration of its constituents and subsequently the tastes. Breast milk is much easier to digest in comparison to formula milk, not forgetting that it is completely sterile and free from any form of contamination.
Apart from being the most economical form of infant nutrition, breastfeeding promotes mother-baby bonding. This not only makes the babies to feel warm, comforted and secure but also improves on the mother's self confidence. Health wise, breastfeeding protects the mother from postpartum depression, ovarian cancer, breast cancer and type 2 diabetes. On a much bigger scale, it saves on overall health care costs, promotes a more productive workforce and creates a clean and greener environment that is not littered with trash, bottle supplies and formula cans plastic wastes.
Among the great number of articles and papers written about the topic of breastfeeding, finding the correct article to use can not only be frustrating but also be very time consuming. However, there are key guidance points that assisted me in specifically pocking this article. Since the topic of breastfeeding is extremely large, information about it is broad.
Therefore to keep the stress levels down, I narrowed the topic to specifically focus on the inherent and proven benefits of breast on infants and children. To synthesize and organize my thoughts before taking time to write the paper, the best source that could help me achieve a concise exposition of the topic had to be short, analytical and fully restricted to a simple but clear presentation of the facts as relates breastfeeding.
Apart from providing an in depth analysis of the benefits of breast milk, the paper goes further and recommends breastfeeding during the first six months without any additional nutritive support. Given that this recommendation is given by a surgeon who is an expert in human health, the authority of the presentation of benefits is unquestionable.
Additional resources and links to further study on breastfeeding were extremely useful for the research because it offers a wide berth of analysis and different viewpoints. The presence of the more than thirty additional resources is a customized library in its own right. To surmise, the article used is highly illuminating and informative.
