Is breastfeeding best practice?

To the Editor: Thank you to McVeagh1 for highlighting some more of the amazing scientific evidence regarding the benefits of breastfeeding. It is extremely important to continue to emphasise the benefits to mother and child in order to strengthen the individual's resolve and the community's support for breastfeeding.

However, my concern is whether the question "Is breastfeeding best practice?" should ever be posed in the first place. Do our natural physiological processes now need to be supported by an evidence base and scrutinised in terms of whether they conform to notions of "best practice"? And should the question about choice between breastfeeding and artificial feeding continue to be asked?

McVeagh also posed the question, "Is there justification in the argument that women are being pushed too hard to breastfeed?". Can there ever be too much encouragement given to women to provide nutrition and nurturing hand-in-hand to their baby?

We must keep emphasising that breastfeeding is not only about good nutrition, reduction in childhood obesity and other measurable health outcomes. Surely there must remain some areas in our lives that do not require evidence and scientific support. Breastfeeding is about loving and nurturing a baby. It is about human relationships. When one experiences a newborn latching on to feed, the clearly felt surge of hormones from breast to brain, the physical expression of these hormones as a palpable "let-down" reflex and the incredible sight of milk rushing from the breast on demand, we do not need science to tell us that this is one of life's most amazing and wonderful experiences, nor to confirm what breastfeeding mothers innately know to be best practice.