AB023. Exclusive breastfeeding: regarding a medical-legal case

Abstract: Multiple national and international organizations recognize the importance of breast-feeding, as the only ideal food for the newborn exclusively during the first six months of life; helps the proper development of infants, fostering the mother-child relationship and reducing the risk of presenting different types of infections. One of the main reasons for the case report is because there is not enough literature in Mexico on child abandonment, in a medical and legal context. What has more weight for the law, the health or safety of the newborn? An unplanned out-of-hospital birth newborn was present to the pediatric emergency room, abandoned on a public road, brought by a female who reports finding the newborn. On admission, the patient had somatometry within normal parameters, Capurro approximately 40 weeks gestation. Entering with diagnoses of severe hypothermia, asymptomatic hypoglycemia and full-term newborn with adequate weight for age. The corresponding authorities were notified. Starting the next day feeding with milk formulas orally through the lactation service that is available in the hospital. On the other hand, in the obstetric emergency area, the same woman who brought the newborn, comments that she is the mother, but she was unaware that she was pregnant. Who later requested fed the newborn with breast milk; however, the authorities denied access to the minor because for the newborn’s safety, since he could not be exposed to the person who abandoned him and put his life at risk. During the fifty-three days of hospital stay, the mother was denied to breastfeed the baby, for legal reasons, but is it ethical to deny breastfeeding to the newborn at such important stage of its development? The hospital is obliged to have the service of a donor human milk bank, or what kind of interventions can be performed? How we can apply the recommendations of the World Health Organization, as the International Code of Regulation of Substitutes?

Keywords: Breast feeding; child abandoned; food security; legal case