UNICEF, Niger sensitise IDPs on exclusive breastfeeding

The United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF), in collaboration with Niger State Government, has sensitised female IDPs on the nutritional value of exclusive breastfeeding as part of activities marking the 4024 World Breastfeeding Week. The Chief of Field Office of UNICEF, Kaduna, Gerida Birukila, represented by Mrs Grace Odeyemi, UNICEF’s consultant in Niger State, said exclusive […]

The United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF), in collaboration with Niger State Government, has sensitised female IDPs on the nutritional value of exclusive breastfeeding as part of activities marking the 4024 World Breastfeeding Week.

The Chief of Field Office of UNICEF, Kaduna, Gerida Birukila, represented by Mrs Grace Odeyemi, UNICEF’s consultant in Niger State, said exclusive breastfeeding helped improve the health of infants.

With the theme: “Closing the Gap, Breastfeeding Support for All”, UNICEF aims to showcase the need to improve support to mothers to practice optimal breastfeeding by breaking cultural and other barriers that prevent lactating mothers from exclusively breastfeeding their infants.

The Niger State Commissioner for Tertiary Health, Dr Bello Tukur, said the 2024 World Breastfeeding Week was a global campaign to create awareness for support for breastfeeding and draw the attention of the populace to the nutrition, health and wellbeing of infants, young children and mothers.

He said over 1,000 breastfeeding mothers, including the IDPs, were mobilised, noting that malnutrition and vaccine preventable diseases such as measles, diphtheria, pertussis and tetanus increased child morbidity and mortality and exacerbated poverty.