An NHS trust has backtracked on guidance claiming that men can breastfeed.
In February, a leaked letter from a Deputy Medical Director at the University Hospitals Sussex NHS Foundation Trust defended the practice of using drugs to enable gender-confused men to lactate.
In a response to a Freedom of Information request, the Trust argued that the now removed guidance was only intended for lesbian women who may want to help the mother breastfeed.
Men can’t breastfeed
Helen Joyce, Director of Advocacy for women’s group Sex Matters, criticised the trust for taking so long to acknowledge that its staff “know that men can’t breastfeed”.
The false information puts babies at risk
Milli Hill, an author and journalist, added: “It absolutely beggars belief that they have taken nearly a year to provide this fairly wooly clarification.”
“The false information puts babies at risk.”
Sidelining mothers
In Scotland, a columnist for The Sunday Times also criticised the Scottish Government for ditching the word ‘mother’ from breastfeeding guidance.
Gillian Bowditch highlighted that it was an active decision “that instead of talking about ‘mums’ who breastfeed, the wording would be changed to ‘someone’ who breastfeeds”.
She asked “whatever happened to civil service neutrality? It is not so much mission creep as a wholesale coup”.
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