Summary: The Department of Health and Human Services has set a goal, by the year 2000, of increasing the percentage of women who breastfeed their infants to at least 75 percent at hospital discharge and to at least 50 percent at five to six months postpartum. Poor women, such as those served by the Special Supplemental Food Program for Women, Infants, and Children (WIC), breastfeed less than other U.S. women. Concern about WIC mothers' low rates of breastfeeding prompted Congress to set aside $8 million annually to promote breastfeeding during fiscal years 1990-94. This report determines (1) how promotional funds for breastfeeding are being spent and what WIC is doing to promote breastfeeding, (2) to what degree breastfeeding promotion is an integral part of local WIC services, (3) whether encouraging WIC participants to breastfeed would reduce WIC food program costs at the program's current funding level or if WIC were funded so that all eligible participants could be served, (4) how effective current WIC efforts to promote breastfeeding are, and (5) whether any changes in federal laws or regulations could encourage breastfeeding.
