The Influence of Infant Feeding Practices on Infant Mortality in Southern Africa

Abstract

Objective To examine the adjusted and unadjusted effects of infant feeding practices on infant mortality in Southern Africa. Methods A merged dataset from the most recent Demographic and Health Surveys for Lesotho, Swaziland, Zambia and Zimbabwe was analysed using the Cox Proportional Hazard Model. A total number of 13,218 infants born in 5 years preceding all the surveys with information on infant feeding practices constituted the study population. Infant mortality was the outcome variable and infant feeding practices categorised into; no breastfeeding, partial breastfeeding and exclusive breastfeeding were the main explanatory variables. Maternal demographic and socio-economic characteristics and infants' bio-demographic characteristics were also studied. Results Although, exclusive breastfeeding was quite low (12 %), exclusively breastfed infants exhibited a 97 % lower risk of dying during infancy compared to infants not breastfed in the region. Variations existed by country in the levels and patterns of both infant mortality and infant feeding practices. Mother's country, highest level of education and marital status; child's sex, birth weight and preceding birth interval were the significant predictors of infant mortality in Southern Africa. Conclusions Any form of breastfeeding whether exclusive or partial breastfeeding greatly reduces the risk of infant mortality with the greatest mortality reduction effect observed among exclusively breastfed infants in Southern Africa. To reduce the upsurge of infant mortality, there is the need to step up the effectiveness of child nutrition programmes that promote breastfeeding and put emphasis on exclusive breastfeeding of infants in the region.

Exploring the Factors Associated with Infant Mortality in Rural Indonesia

“…Mothers who have male babies are more likely to have a higher risk of infant mortality than female babies. It is in line with research in South Africa that revealed that female infants tend to have a lower risk of infant mortality than male babies (Motsa et al, 2016). Previous research has shown a higher relationship between infant mortality in males than in females (Sovio et al, 2012).…”

“…The duration of breastfeeding in the first six months is one of the predictors of a significant reduction in infant mortality (Oktaria et al, 2017;Sankar et al, 2015). A study in South Africa showed that exclusive or partial breastfeeding reduces the risk of infant mortality (Motsa et al, 2016) This study found that maternal education has a significant effect on infant mortality in rural Indonesia. Mothers with higher secondary education are more likely to experience infant survival than mothers with primary or uneducated education in rural Bangladesh (Akter et al, 2015).…”

“…In regards to the association between socioeconomic status and infant and child mortality, Kiross et al (2019) emphasized the effect of the educational background of the mother on decreasing infant mortality. Furthermore, Motsa et al (2016) reveal a notion that the mother's schooling would influence the mother's knowledge of general nutrition and health care practices that might encourage those mothers to perform better health behavior and by altering the traditional marital relationships. Mother's education can increase the chance of infant survival by postponing women to marry and enter motherhood later and have fewer children, employ prenatal care, and vaccinate their children (Akter et al, 2015, Muj & Bhradwaj, 2015.…”

Peningkatan Pemberian ASI dan MP-ASI Melalui Kader Parapam di Desa Karanganyar, Karanganyar Kebumen

“…Beberapa penelitian menyebutkan bahwa masalah gizi pada bayi dan anak disebabkan kebiasaan ASI dan MP-ASI yang tidak tepat (kuantitas dan kualitas). Selain itu, adanya kebiasaan pemberian makanan bayi yang tidak tepat seperti: pemberian makanan yang terlalu awal atau terlambat, makanan yang diberikan tidak sesuai porsi dan frekuensi yang kurang (Motsa, Ibisomi, & Odimegwu, 2016). Pemberian makanan yang terlalu lambat akan menyebabkan bayi mengalami kesulitan mengunyah, tidak menyukai makanan padat dan kekurangan gizi.…”

Relactation in lactation failure and low milk supply

“…Breastfeeding (BF) is "natural" and "best feed" for infants since evaluation of mankind. Exclusive BF not only helps in bringing down the mortality and morbidity during infancy but is also helpful to mothers in many ways [1,2]. BF is evidence based intervention that has been found to be significantly reduced the neonatal as well as child mortality by 13% [3].…”