Cross-breastfeeding and milk donation in Brazil

• Autor(a) principal: Siqueira Boccolini, Cristiano
• Data de Publicação: 2023
• Outros Autores: Bertoni dos Reis, Neilane, Rodrigues Farias, Dayana, Lelis Berti, Talita, Maria de Aquino Lacerda, Elisa, Rugani Ribeiro de Castro, Inês, Kac, Gilberto, on Child Nutrition, Brazilian Consortium
• Tipo de documento: Artigo
• Idioma: eng
• Título da fonte: Cadernos de Saúde Pública
• Texto Completo: https://cadernos.ensp.fiocruz.br/ojs/index.php/csp/article/view/8369
• topic: Aleitamento Materno; Bancos de Leite Humano; Nutrição; Saúde Materna; Lactancia Materna; Bancos de Leche Humana; Nutrición; Salud Materna; Breastfeeding; Milk Banks; Nutrition; Maternal Health

The objective of this study was to describe the frequency of cross-breastfeeding, human milk donation to human milk banks and reception of human milk from human milk banks, and to investigate the intersection between cross-breastfeeding and breast milk donation practices. This study used data from the national household-based survey Brazilian National Survey on Child Nutrition (ENANI-2019), which collected information from 14,558 children < 5 years old between February 2019 and March 2020. The present study included data from 5,831 biological mothers who reported having breastfed their child < 2 years old at least once and replied questions about cross-breastfeeding, donation and recaption of human milk to human milk banks. Prevalence and 95% confidence intervals (95%CI) were estimated for each stratifier, considering the study complex sample design. Among mothers of children < 2 years old who breastfed their child at least once, 21.1% practiced cross-breastfeeding; breastfeeding another child was more frequent (15.6%) than allowing a child to be breastfed by another woman (11.2%). Among this population, 4.8% of women donated human milk to a human milk bank, and 3.6% reported that their children had received donated human milk. The donation of human milk is a practice recommended by the Brazilian Ministry of Health and has the potential to save thousands of newborns throughout Brazil. In contrast, cross-breastfeeding is contraindicated due to the potential risk of transmitting HIV. There is a need for a broad debate on these practices in Brazil and worldwide.