Mums to be given shopping vouchers for BF

[tazgirl]

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-24900650

News story on BBC news at lunchtime. WTF?? This is ridiculous on so many levels. Can I have £600 as we're almost at 18 months?!

 

[MrsBandEgglet]

I was on the steering group for this as part of the research by the university of Sheffield and I was very sceptical at first but I am extremely optimistic that it will be a success and will improve bf rates in the areas it's been trialled. These areas have extremely low bf rates and so I'm hoping this scheme is a great stepping stone into educating some people on how great bf can be for everyone. I was critical at first and we had to really get our heads around how you were going to be able to govern this so to speak, but I think it could be successful, or at least I hope so.

 

[babies7777]

I was given some god awful so called breastfeeding "help" from the midwives after giving birth, they need to solve this and i truly believe it would make all the difference along with, cluster feeding info etc, the kellymom website creators should train midwives and health visitors on breastfeeding!

 

[Dream.dream]

It has to do more with health care cost then anything , breast fed babies cost the health care system less money so investing in ways to get more people to breastfeed longer saves them money in the long run

 

[m79]

The benefits to baby should be all you need to try to bf but unfortunately not all mothers think like this . I went throughout weeks of hell to feed my second but I know all to many that have up at the first hurdle . Maybe this will drive them to try a bit harder no matter how wrong that is your baby should be your driving force

 

[skye93]

How will they even police this though?
I mean people could easily say they are breastfeeding when they aren't.

 

[annio84]

I have to say, I really wanted to breastfeed and it's been hard at times even though I've been fairly lucky and had no real problems. I wonder what the impact will be of women trying to slog through the hard times when they aren't committed to it for the right reasons? Could there be a chance that women will do it purely for the money and then end up developing negative feelings towards their baby? Obviously it may go the other way and people who didn't consider feeding may find they love it and I am all for giving women encouragement to persevere but I'm not certain this is the best way.

 

[lexie1994]

I seriously believe that they should put the money into teaching the midwives how to actually breastfeed! I live where they are doing the trial because we have such a low rate and when I had my little girl, they told me one way to TRY to feed her which was the most ridiculously hard thing I've ever had to do! The woman trying to teach me had never fed a baby as i had asked her, and asked her for didferent ways to try and she said this is the only one you can do. Needless to say, I gave up in the hospital and said I would bottle feed her, when I got home I was determined to try my hardest researching the best ways to try and with my mums support I cracked it, but that's because I had the determination to do what was best for my little girl and here we are, 2 days and she will be one and we both did it all on our own, I was only 18 at the time, yes breastfeeding isn't for everyone but how can people even be expected to learn when they don't know how to teach you!

 

[lynnikins]

i expect to police it they then will have the mw's and health visitors needing to actually be there for a feed, no 4/5 month old non bf baby is going to latch and feed just because mummy trys to ge them to unless they have only really recently stopped bf.

but there needs to more trained BF support workers and lactation consultants around. Im planning on doing my training so that I can help as the nearest qualified help where i am is 20 miles away and costs too much to have come out to help. I only survived BF my eldest because of good support right at the start and on going support. without that id be bottle feeding my youngest and would have bottle fed all my others

 

[Celesse]

I can see how it could work in some areas. If BFing is not really the done thing and women are choosing not to cos of peer pressure they can just laugh off their decision to BF with "well, I'm getting paid to do so". More women in the area breastfeed and it becomes more normal to do so and not so taboo.