To ask the Minister of Health to detail the current breastfeeding levels among new mothers; and for his assessment of any changes to this trend over recent years.

In 2020, provisional data from the Northern Ireland Maternity System (NIMATS) shows that breastfeeding was attempted for around six out of ten births (62.5%) in Northern Ireland, a 5.7% increase from 56.8% in 2015. Data also shows that the rate of breastfeeding varies according to the mother’s age, with older mothers generally more likely to attempt breastfeeding. For example, in 2020, 45.6% of mothers aged 20-24 years attempted to breastfeed compared to 67.3% of mothers aged 30-34 years. A similar trend is observed for previous years.

Data from the Northern Ireland Child Health System (CHS) shows that there has been an increasing trend in the rate of any breastfeeding at discharge from hospital, from 45.1% in 2015 to 49.2% in 2019 (provisional data). More recent provisional figures from NIMATS for 2020 indicate that 50.4% of infants were receiving any breastmilk at discharge.

Note that data included in this response from the draft Health Intelligence Breastfeeding Brief 2021 currently in development is provisional until publication of the brief.

Previous briefs are available at https://www.publichealth.hscni.net/directorates/operations/statistics