Is breastfeeding still encouraged after COVID-19 vaccination?
To protect yourself, your family members and patients, colleagues are encouraged to receive COVID-19 vaccination as appropriate. However, new mothers may hesitate to continue breastfeeding their babies after vaccination. Christine Lam, Nurse Consultant (Breastfeeding) of Queen Elizabeth Hospital, says that World Health Organisation and Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recommended breastfeeding mothers to get vaccinated with reasons below:
- Antibodies in the breastmilk could protect the babies
- Reduce the risk of infection of lactating women
- No mRNA vaccine has been found in breastmilk after vaccination, so the babies would not be affected
Tips on breastfeeding under pandemic
Under the pandemic, mothers may be worried about the safety of breastfeeding. According to the latest information, neither viable infectious virus in breastmilk nor the evidence of virus passing through breastmilk has been found. The following breastfeeding tips would be useful for colleagues, in particular those who work in the isolation ward:
- Follow the 3W principle:
Wash hand Wear mask Wipe the surface - Bring an extra breast pump set to save cleansing procedures
- Clean the surface with alcohol wipe/ standard disinfectant before setting up the breast pump equipment
- Wash your hands thoroughly. Sometimes expressing milk by hand is more practical and flexible than using a breast pump
- Take a bath before holding the baby, then you can hold and feed the baby as usual
- If you cannot breastfeed the baby immediately, store the breastmilk in the refrigerator. Breastmilk can be stored at 4°C or below for four days, and up to six months in deep frozen (below -18°C)
- During this period of stress, milk volume may decrease. Your milk volume will recover when you resume direct feeding or pump milk more frequently