Breastfeeding practices in US households by food security status

Abstract

Food insecurity takes on a unique meaning for low-income mothers with infants and young children. Underprivileged women not encouraged to breastfeed are faced each day with the need to respond to their hungry infants without sufficient food. Therefore, in low income populations, protection of optimal breastfeeding practices is a top priority. In this study we assessed the relationship between household food security status and breastfeeding patterns among women and infants through the most recent National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey data sets (NHANES 1999–2000 & 2001–2002). Two food security status categories were constructed from the 4 categories in NHANES: 1) fully food secure households (FFSHH); and 2) households with any degree of food insecurity (FISHH), which combines households marginally food secure, food insecure without hunger, and food insecure with hunger. Differences among food insecurity categories with respect to breastfeeding were examined using chi-square and t-test. Results show that the proportion of women who breast fed their infants for at least one month was higher among those living in FFSHH (55.3%) than among women living in FISHH (49.1%) (p < 0.05). In addition, 66% of infants living in FFSHH were ever breast fed in comparison to 57% of infants living in FISHH (p = 0.02). Finally, infants living in FFSHH were breast fed longer by 38 days than infants living in FISHH (p = 0.003). It is critical to better understand these relationships and emphasize the importance of breastfeeding practices in low-income population groups.