New study shows low breastfeeding rates cost the US $13 billion/year

Low breastfeeding rates cost the U.S. $13 billion each year and result in more than 900 preventable deaths, according to a newly published study in the journal Pediatrics.

Despite medical recommendations that urge new mothers to breastfeed exclusively for the first six months of infants' lives with continued breastfeeding during at least the first year, only 32% of babies are exclusively breastfed at three months of age, and that number shrinks to 12% at six months of age. Low exclusive breastfeeding rates are costly to the US in both direct health care costs and in lost productivity.

A cost analysis was conducted for all pediatric diseases for which the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality reported risk ratios that favored breastfeeding: necrotizing enterocolitis, otitis media, gastroenteritis, hospitalization for lower respiratory tract infections, atopic dermatitis, sudden infant death syndrome, childhood asthma, childhood leukemia, type 1 diabetes mellitus, and childhood obesity.

Results of the study showed that if 90% of US families complied with medical recommendations to breastfeed exclusively for 6 months, the United States would save $13 billion per year and prevent an excess 911 deaths, nearly all of which would be in infants A savings of $10.5 billion and 741 deaths were calculated at 80% compliance.

This study may help insurers and policy makers understand the importance of breastfeeding as a public health issue. Breastfeeding advocates may wish to use this data when needing to validate the economic cost of not breastfeeding and to illustrate that everyone pays when babies are not breastfed.