I am copying the following with Marilyn's permission. These were remarks
made at the Press Conference held on July 8th at the
Brome-Missisquoi-Perkins Hospital in Cowansville, Quebec.
Maureen Fjeld
Co-Chair, Breastfeeding Committee for Canada
Calgary, Alberta
Remarks from Marilyn Sanders, Advisor, BFHI, UNICEF Canada and National
Coordinator, Breastfeeding Committee for Canada
Brome –Missisquoi-Perkins Hospital, Cowansville QC
July 8, 1999
It is indeed a great honour and privilege for me to be here today to help
celebrate a truly memorable achievement – the designation of the first
Baby-Friendly Hospital in Canada!!
As you know, the Baby-Friendly Hospital Initiative is an international
program devised by the United Nation’s Children’s Fund and the World Health
Organization to protect, promote and support breastfeeding. To date, over
14,000 hospitals worldwide have been assessed against exacting standards as
outlined in the Ten Steps to Successful Breastfeeding. The
Brome-Missisquoi-Perkins Hospital is the first in Canada to have proved it
can meet or exceed those standards, designed to ensure that children receive
the best possible start in life through breastfeeding.
As the Baby-Friendly Hospital Initiative is the only UNICEF program which is
delivered in both developing and developed countries, it holds a unique
place in the work of UNICEF. Historically, it has its roots in the 1980’s
when UNICEF developed a four part plan to try to stem the tide of child
mortality and morbidity in the developing world. The four tenants of that
plan were the use of growth charts to monitor child development, the use of
oral rehydration therapy to save children from death by dehydration (often
brought on by diarrhea caused by drinking impure water), the promotion of
breastfeeding as the optimal method of infant feeding and immunization of
children against the most deadly childhood diseases.
This program was very successful and from it sprang such things as "days of
tranquility" when fighting in war-torn countries came to a halt to allow
children to be immunized.
However, the tremendous success of the breastfeeding aspect of this program
led the late Executive Director of UNICEF, James Grant, to have a dream – he
dreamed that every hospital in the world would embrace the Ten Steps to
Successful Breastfeeding and become truly "Baby-Friendly" by ensuring that
its staff was trained and its expectant mothers were informed about the
tremendous benefits of breastfeeding and the , often unexplained, hazards of
feeding with manufactured infant formula. He understood that because
breastfeeding had gone "out of fashion" in most of the developed world
during and after World War II, this program, unlike any other operated by
UNICEF, must also be delivered in "first world" countries, like Canada.
In 1990, following on the entering into force of the Convention on the
Rights of the Child and the World Summit for Children, which encouraged all
countries to "create an environment to enable all women to breastfeed", the
Baby-Friendly Hospital Initiative was born, as part of a joint UNICEF/WHO
nutrition plan for the 1990s.
Since 1992 it has been my privilege to represent UNICEF Canada on what is
now the Breastfeeding Committee for Canada, the National Authority for the
implementation of the Baby-Friendly Hospital Initiative in Canada. During
that time it has been my privilege to work with many dedicated people who
are determined to make breastfeeding, once again in Canada, the "cultural
norm".
The success of the Brome-Missisquoi-Perkins Hospital in becoming Canada’s
first Baby-Friendly Hospital is a tribute to the hard work and dedication of
hospital staff, administration . It is also a tribute to the many tireless
breastfeeding advocates right across our country for whom this hospital’s
success is a beacon of hope that sometime in the future, all women may be
able to breastfeed their babies "any time any where".
Thank you!!
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