When talking about the importance of giving breast milk to babies, it is not said just because it is what a baby needs to have normal development, but also because it is what the body of a mother who gives birth expects so that her health does not suffer.
We know, among other things, that mothers who do not breastfeed their children are at increased risk of breast cancer and we also know that they have a higher risk of Alzheimer's disease. Now, we also know that they have twice as likely to suffer from rheumatoid arthritis.
We know this from a recent study in China in which, knowing that hormonal and reproductive factors are related to rheumatoid arthritis, they wanted to know what influence the use of oral contraceptives and the history of breastfeeding had on the prevalence of the disease .
Study Data
To do the study, they used a sample of 7,349 women under 50 years of age who took a series of questionnaires to get the sociodemographic profile, learn about the lifestyle and obstetric history data, including parity, if they had taken oral contraceptives and if they had breastfed. All the data were crossed with the diagnoses of rheumatoid arthritis, also examining the women to know what the state of inflammation of their joints was.
The researchers saw that women who had breastfed had half the risk of suffering from rheumatoid arthritis than those who had not. The risk was The shorter the duration of breastfeeding, to the point that those who had done so for more than 36 months had almost half the risk (on average) of suffering from the disease than those who had breastfed less.
In reference to oral contraceptives, they observed that, although they also modify the hormonal system of women, their use did not change the prevalence of rheumatoid arthritis.
Conclusions of the study
The researchers did not speak at the time of trying to give a biological explanation that explains why not breastfeeding increases the probability of suffering from arthritis, but they said that the results obtained should be taken into account, especially now that the rates Breastfeeding are declining in the country and taking into account the policy of the only child they carry out, which causes women to breastfeed even less than if they had more children.
Bringing the study to our country, because more of the same. The lack of help to the population is causing birth rates decrease and couples increasingly have fewer children. It is true that breastfeeding rates are increasing, but there are still a minority who breastfeed their babies for more than six months, although the recommendation is to do so at least until two years.
This makes clear the importance of getting that the women are well informed of the risks that come with your health and that of your baby, do not breastfeed and, more importantly, ensure that health professionals are well trained to be able to help mothers who want to breastfeed to get it. Let's not forget that according to surveys, 93% of women who stop breastfeeding would rather not have done so.
