Babies fed on their mother's milk for at least six months have 'significantly better mental health' than those fed with formula.
Breast-fed babies were also less likely to exhibit problems such as anti-social behaviour and delinquency. According to researchers, breast milk plays an important role in the growth of the brain during a child's first year, and experts yesterday urged more women to breast-feed for longer than six months.
Government advice is for women to breast-feed for at least that time to provide the nutrients a child needs. But with a third of women stopping within six weeks of giving birth, Britain has one of the lowest rates of breast-feeding in Europe. The study was conducted by scientists who tracked the development of 2,500 children in Australia over 16 years. The team, from the Telethon Institute for Child Health Research in Perth, analysed the children for mental or behavioural problems at various ages.
They found that children who were breast-fed for less than six months were 55 per cent more likely to have mental health problems by the time they were six than those breast-fed for longer. However, this fell to 37 per cent by the time children were ten. The study also found that children who were not breast-fed for six months or more were 61 per cent more likely to exhibit problems, such as anti-social behaviour, by the time they were eight.
Dr Wendy Oddy, who led the study, suggested there may be 'bioactive factors in breast milk' which produced better-adjusted children.
'Even when we take into account other factors such as the parents' socio-economic situation, their education, their happiness and family functioning, we see that children that were breast-fed for at least six months are at lower risk of mental health problems,' she said. She added that children who were breast-fed had 'particularly lower rates of delinquent, aggressive and anti-social behaviour, and overall were less depressed, anxious or withdrawn' in later life.
Other studies have shown that breast milk protects babies against stomach bugs, chest infections, asthma, eczema and allergies.
For many years mothers were told that breast-fed children had higher IQs. However, a study last month found it was the mother's intelligence rather than her breast-milk, which gave the children higher IQs.
November 2006 | 
Doctor Must Pay Maintenance For Unwanted Baby
