United Press International – Study: Mother’s milk improves long-term

TEL AVIV, Israel, Oct. 6 (UPI) — Israeli researchers have determined the nutritional value of mother’s milk is much higher after one year of breastfeeding than at six months.

Pediatricians Dror Mendel and Ronit Lubetzky at Tel Aviv’s Sourasky Medical Center studied 61 women, 27 of whom breastfed for up to half a year and the rest between 12 and 39 months.

The percentage of fat in mother’s milk during long-term breastfeeding averaged 11 percent and reached as high as 28 percent, while breast milk of women who nursed their babies for only several months averaged 7.4 percent and went as high as 12 percent.

Mendel told the Jerusalem Post said the findings constituted the first scientific-academic study comparing the nutritional value of mother’s milk in short-term and long-term breastfeeding, and counters a myth among pediatricians that the longer a woman breastfeeds, the less nutritious her milk.”‘

Woo hoo let’s hear it for extended breastfeeding!