View report page

72
Breast Feeding. I am as yet unable to compare with the
above table, figures for this district showing the proportions in
which the several methods of feeding occur among a normal healthy
group of children of the same age, but it has been found in Croydon
that among a certain section of the population very similar to our
own, 58 per cent, of children under six months of age are fed by
the breast alone, the remaining 42 per cent, being fed by other
forms of milk or prepared foods. In the absence of figures of our
own, showing this percentage, I may, I think, take this standard of
Croydon's as representing, approximately, what would be found in
this district. It will, at any rate, serve as a rough indication of the
normal frequency of breast feeding among a community not unlike
the one in question. If this standard is compared, then, with our
group of fatal cases under six months of age, it is found that among
the latter barely 22 per cent, have been fed on the breast alone.
To state it in tabular form :—

In this comparison I have taken infants under 6 months, for up to
that age at any rate, children ought to be entirely breast fed. The
earliest age at death among these infants was 18 days, so that all
had lived long enough to be influenced by the food they had
received. Though the figures dealt with are small, they still serve
to show the greatly decreased proportion of breast fed infants
found amongst the fatal cases, compared with an ordinary infant
population.