Unicef’s Baby Friendly Initiative was introduced to the UK in 1995 to “support breastfeeding and parent infant relationships by working with public services to improve standards of care.”^5 Comparative data collected from countries around the world indicates that the UK does well in some aspects:⁶

• Early initiation of breastfeeding within one hour of birth occurs in 81 per cent of cases in the UK, ranking it ninth out of 80 countries
• 98 per cent of UK babies are being introduced to complementary feeding (weaning) as recommended at six to eight months – fifth highest out of 79 countries.

But it falls very short in others:

• Only 17 per cent of UK babies are breastfed exclusively for the first six months, ranking it 73rd out of 84 countries 
• The median duration of breastfeeding in the UK is three months, ranking it 75th out of 81 (median duration is 15.5 months) 
• 88 per cent of breastfed UK babies are also bottle fed before they are one year old – third highest when the average rate of 75 countries was 39 per cent.

UK data from the World Breastfeeding Trends Initiative study was published in November 2016.⁷ The WBTi UK working group noted: “Three out of five UK mothers who had stopped breastfeeding by six to eight months said they wanted to breastfeed for longer.” Scotland and Northern Ireland have done more to introduce policies and programmes to empower mothers in a bid to improve on low breastfeeding rates, it said, compared to England and Wales. Here, mothers “cite lack of support and breastfeeding falls off rapidly.”