Healthcare Minister stresses need to promote breast feeding

Nadira GUNATILLEKE

Sri Lanka’s breast feeding rate is 78 per cent and we stand well ahead of all the other South Asian countries and some of the developed countries such as the United States and China.

In Sri Lanka the period of breast feeding is six months. We have to further promote breast feeding in order to achieve a 80 or 90 percent rate, Healthcare and Nutrition Minister Nimal Siripala de Silva said.

He was addressing the advocacy workshop held in Colombo on Monday to mark the National Breast Feeding Week. Minister de Silva said that although Sri Lanka has achieved several landmark victories in different fields and records very high health and social indicators some parties see only the small shortcomings. They never see the country’s achievements.

Breast feeding should be extended up to two years. At least it should be extended to one year as an initial step. But still Sri Lankan mothers stop breast feeding after six, eight or 10 months. There are 350,000 child births recorded in Sri Lanka annually. A mother’s nutrition is very important when it comes to breast feeding.

The supply of Thriposha will be doubled by next year and its content will also be made more nutritious. But without a drastic change in the attitude of mothers and especially fathers, there will not be any progress, the Minister said.

Minister de Silva pointed out that the nutrition level of African children is better than that of Sri Lankan children and all South Asian countries lag behind Africa when it comes to nutrition. Latin America and Europe also stand ahead of Sri Lanka.

Developed countries try to sell certain tined nutritional supplements to Sri Lanka but we must try to feed our children with traditional Sri Lankan food freely available all over the country at very low prices.

A majority of Sri Lankan children are being given light food after they grow up and this is one of the main reasons for their low level of nutrition.

The Minister stressed the importance of assessing the services carried out by family health workers, MOHs and others in order to meet the targets and encourage them to work harder.

Foreign scholarships will be given to them after assessing their work and considering their achievements.

Those serving in rural areas would be given preference when granting such scholarships.