By Melissa Bartick, MD
Is breastfeeding really being “oversold?” If breastfeeding saves lives, we should see that infant deaths go down when breastfeeding rates go up.
Three diseases that affect infant mortality are captured in yearly vital statistics reports, and would demonstrate an immediate impact from changing breastfeeding rates, if such an impact were found: Sudden Infant Death Syndrome, necrotizing enterocolitis (NEC), and lower respiratory tract infections (LRTI).