Four Coimbatore women donate 16 litre of breast milk

COIMBATORE: Four new mothers, who are still nursing their newborns, donated 16 litre of breastmilk, called “liquid gold”, to the breast milk bank in Coimbatore Medical College Hospital on Sunday.
Two mothers of older children who collected the breast milk from the new mothers froze it for three weeks before donating the milk to CMCH. The donation was part of the Coimbatore Parenting Network’s “Uyirthuzhi” project.
“This is the largest quantity we have donated in a single shot,” said M Aishwarya, a mother and a trustee of the network. The network that has been motivating mothers to donate their excess breast milk, has been donating milk since 2016. However, their usual quantity was about 2 to 3 litres each time.
“We motivate young mothers to collect, store and donate their excess breast milk, rather than throwing it or letting it be till it leads to engorgement,” she said. “We also assure them that donating excess milk will not deprive their babies of milk. More the milk is drained out, more the supply,” she added.
This donated milk is usually screened for all infections, pasteurized and then frozen again, before being given to babies on a priority basis. Donated breast milk is usually given to extremely premature babies, weighing between 650 gm and 750 gm, whose mothers’ secretions have not yet begun and who are too vulnerable to digest formula. This would also benefit abandoned babies who are found in underweight sickly conditions.
With extremely small premature babies consuming hardly 10 ml to 30 ml a day, the milk can feed at least 100 premature babies for five days each, by which usually the mother’s milk secretion starts.
S Shreepriya, 24, who had an oversupply and donated her milk, said she felt proud and happy about her contribution. “I realised that this is something that no one else can buy or recreate,” she said, adding that the reward is worth the extra pumping sessions.