Breastfeeding at 6 to 8 weeks, 2023 to 2024 statistical commentary
Published 5 November 2024
Applies to England
© Crown copyright 2024
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This publication is available at https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/breastfeeding-at-6-to-8-weeks-after-birth-annual-data-april-2023-to-march-2024/breastfeeding-at-6-to-8-weeks-2023-to-2024-statistical-commentary
What’s new
The prevalence of breastfeeding at 6 to 8 weeks has been updated with data for England, regions and upper tier local authorities for 2023 to 2024.
Introduction
Breastfeeding provides the best possible nutritional start in life for a baby, protecting the baby from infection and offering important health benefits for the mother. The government’s advice is that infants should be exclusively breastfed, receiving only breastmilk for the first 6 months of life. Following this, other drinks and foodstuffs can be introduced.
Main findings
This update shows:
- the prevalence of breastfeeding at 6 to 8 weeks in England increased to 52.7% in 2023 to 2024 compared with 49.2% in 2022 to 2023 (see figure 1). This is the highest prevalence of breastfeeding at 6 to 8 weeks reported since 2015 to 2016 when the current data collection commenced
- the longer term trend in prevalence of breastfeeding at 6 to 8 weeks in England is one of increase, up from 48.0% in 2019 to 2020
- breastfeeding rates are generally improving at local level in England. Of the 72 upper tier local authorities with valid data for 2023 to 2024 and 2022 to 2023, 46 significantly increased, 26 were stable and none significantly decreased
- there is wide variation in breastfeeding rates in upper tier local authorities across England, ranging from 27.6% in Halton to 81.2% in Hertfordshire
- 5 regions did not pass data validation and do not have a breastfeeding rate published. In the other 4 regions, there is a 20.8 percentage point gap between the North East, which is the lowest at 38.5%, and the East of England, which is the highest at 59.3%
- mothers living in affluent areas are more likely to breastfeed than mothers living in more deprived areas. The gap in breastfeeding rates at 6 to 8 weeks between the most and least deprived areas in England has decreased to 10.7 percentage points in 2023 to 2024 (see figure 2), which is down from a 15.8 percentage points in 2022 to 2023
- most deprivation groups have seen an increase year on year apart from the most affluent areas, which have seen a marginal decrease. The most and least deprived areas are determined using deprivation scores for upper tier local authorities
Figure 1: prevalence of breastfeeding at 6 to 8 weeks in England, 2015 to 2016 to 2023 to 2024.
Figure 2: inequalities in breastfeeding prevalence at 6 to 8 weeks by upper tier local authority deprivation decile (IMD2019) in England, 2023 to 2024
Background
The information within this publication relates to the service coverage and related health outcomes for services funded via the local authority public health grant for children’s public health 0 to 5 years. This includes the coverage of universal health visitor reviews, breastfeeding at 6 to 8 weeks and child development outcomes aged 2.
The data has been obtained via OHID’s interim reporting system for children’s public health 0 to 5 years which collects health visiting activity and related outcomes (breastfeeding and child development outcomes) at a local authority resident level.
Caution should be exercised when interpreting these figures as it is a voluntary data collection and there is not full coverage. Any figures shown at a region or England level are based on an aggregate total of local authorities within those areas who supplied data items which complied with validation criteria for each indicator.
In the longer term, reporting on health visitor activity and related outcomes will increasingly draw data from NHS England’s Community Services Data Set (CSDS). This solution will allow more flexibility in reporting, including options for metrics at lower geographical levels, and for inequalities to be described and monitored. Reporting from a record-level data set enforces standard definitions in a way that was not previously possible.
The technical guidance contains full details of the health visiting, breastfeeding and child development indicators, including definitions and methodology. Previous related publications are available on the Child and maternal health statistics page for:
- health visitor service delivery metrics
- child development outcomes at two to two and a half years
All the data is available on Fingertips.
Contact information
For media enquiries please contact the Department of Health and Social Care media team.
For all other enquiries relating to the statistics or to offer feedback on the publication please contact us at interimreporting@dhsc.gov.uk.