Overview

• WHO and UNICEF conclude World Breastfeeding Week by urging governments to invest in high-quality breastfeeding support and enforce the International Code of Marketing of Breast-milk Substitutes to reach a 60 percent exclusive rate by 2030.
• Agencies highlighted that every dollar invested in breastfeeding generates US$35 in economic returns and that scaling counselling and provider training could save about 820,000 child lives annually.
• Telangana has opened three government-run Comprehensive Lactation Management Centres under the Dhaatri Milk Bank project and plans to expand donor-milk networks for vulnerable infants.
• India’s latest measures encompass extended paid maternity leave, dedicated workplace lactation rooms and community peer counselling programmes to strengthen breastfeeding ecosystems.
• National myth-busting campaigns are tackling misconceptions such as discarding colostrum and small-breast milk shortages to boost maternal confidence in exclusive breastfeeding.