title: Breast feeding: social, economic and medical considerations.
abstract: A certain attitude and lifestyle is needed if breast feeding is to be successful. It must have priority over all other activities save the very basic ones. The rural environment provides a situation in which breast feeding can flourish . With urbanisation and the accompanying change in lifestyle breast feeding becomes very difficult. Since successful breast feeding needs strong motivation, the change in attitude of urbanised wives makes it even more unlikely. The Singapore experience demonstrates this convincingly; even though awareness of the benefits of breast feeding is widespread, the motivation to breast feed is not. Remedial measures should take into consideration the need to motivate the mother and family, the prevention of commercial infant food companies influencing public opinion, and incentives for the working mothers to breast feed.
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D001290:Attitude; D001942:Breast Feeding; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D007223:Infant; D007226:Infant Mortality; D007231:Infant, Newborn; D008019:Life Style; D008297:Male; D008895:Milk, Human / Q000276:immunology; D009042:Motivation; D011247:Pregnancy; D012846:Singapore; D012931:Social Environment; D012959:Socioeconomic Factors