The impact of Baby Friendly Initiative accreditation: An overview of systematic reviews (1 June, 2021)

Summary

Despite its reported benefits, breastfeeding rates are low globally, and support systems such as the Baby Friendly Initiative (BFI) have been established to support healthy infant feeding practices and infant bonding. Increasingly reviews are being undertaken to assess the overall impact of BFI accreditation. A systematic synthesis of current reviews has therefore been carried out to examine the state of literature on the effects of BFI accreditation. 

Content

Key messages

• Current evidence suggests there may be some improvement in initiation and breastfeeding duration with Baby Friendly Initiative accreditation, especially in low-income countries; however, confidence in these findings was very low. There is minimal evidence of the impact of BFI accreditation on maternal and infant health outcomes.
• The majority of current evidence assessing BFI accreditation was of poor methodology or at high risk of bias.
• More contemporary, good-quality randomised controlled trials or well-controlled prospective comparative cohorts are required to better evaluate the impact of BFI accreditation.
• Particular attention is needed to the context of the research, both background socio-economic and breastfeeding practices, and to explore longer term outcomes to see if benefits in breastfeeding duration are sustained.