Establishment of the First Religiously-compliant Human Milk Bank in Bangladesh

Abstract

Human milk banks (HMBs) collect, screen, process, and dispense donated human milk (HM). There are more than 500 large HMBs in the world but only a few are functioning in Muslim countries, and that too on a limited scale. Human milk banks that are similar to those in the Western countries have been difficult to establish in Muslim countries as Islamic laws do not allow the consumption of unidentified donated milk from multiple donors. Human milk is known to be important for nutrition in premature and critically ill infants, and so there is a well-recognized need to develop religiously compliant and conditionally identified HMBs in Muslim countries. In these milk banks, every mother's milk is processed and stored separately, and the milk provided by one mother can be provided to an infant from a different family only after appropriately counseling both families about the Islamic laws of prohibition of future marriages between milk siblings. Documents related to these issues are provided to both families and data need to be maintained for future reference. In this article, we recount the educational, financial, and infrastructural challenges that we faced in establishing religiously-compliant HMB in Bangladesh. There is already a noticeable reduction in infant mortality in our region.

Milk Fat Globules: 2024 Updates

“…27,32 These products could also be useful for infant nutrition in societies with religious/social restrictions on the use of banked HM. 33…”