ABM Advocates for Breastfeeding at the United Nations

ABM, as a worldwide organization dedicated to the promotion, protection and support of breastfeeding, has been involved in promoting breastfeeding at the UN for the past 10 years. ABM became a Non-Governmental Organization (NGO) in consultative status with the UN Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC) and is a member of the NGO Committee on UNICEF. As it is impossible to accomplish anything at the UN without collaboration, we partner with ILCA, WABA and CGBI as members of the “UN Breastfeeding Advocacy Team” known as “UNBAT”, to raise breastfeeding awareness at the UN and UNICEF.

This has been a busy year for advocacy. UNICEF drafted a Breastfeeding Advocacy Strategy in March which was improved with our input. We look forward to working with UNICEF in refining the advocacy strategy and developing an implementation plan over the next year. ABM representatives participated in events celebrating the 25th Anniversary of the Convention on the Rights of the Child which frames good health, including breastfeeding, as a fundamental right, in November in New York.

We are currently collaborating with our partners to include breastfeeding in the post-2015 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) which will be finalized by December, 2015 to replace the Millennium Development Goals which are expiring. Getting breastfeeding promotion into the post-2015 agenda is extremely important. We worked with our UNBAT partners and the Health NGO Group to request that breastfeeding be included as one of the “critical health-related issues to achieve sustainable development.”

ABM and its partners have applied to sponsor a “parallel event” at the annual Commission on the Status of Women in New York in March to raise the profile of breastfeeding as an important measure which improves the health of women and children.

We are encouraged by the increasing attention to breastfeeding at the UN and UNICEF and feel that there will be more opportunities to promote breastfeeding as part of the post-2015 Sustainable Development agenda, through the UNICEF Advocacy Strategy, during the CSW events and through ongoing collaboration with other health and nutrition groups. If any ABM members want to assist in this important work, please contact us.

Susan Vierczhalek, MD, FABM is ABM representative to the UN, Associate Professor of Clinical Pediatrics at New York University School of Medicine, medical Director of the Bellevue Hospital Newborn Service and Breastfeeding Program, Chair of the NY State Breastfeeding Coalition, Medical Director of the New York Milk Bank.

Larry Noble, MD, FABM, IBCLC is ABM representative to the UN with Susan, a neonatologist and Associate Professor of Pediatrics at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai in New York City and a Board member of ABM.