Editorial
Create conducive office space for breastfeeding mothers
For nursing women who want to nurse their newborns entirely after returning from their three-month maternity leave, a lack of work space presents a significant obstacle.
Therefore, it is excellent to designate a private, convenient and comfortable space where mothers can nurse their babies when they go back to work.
The World Health Organisation (WHO) advised breastfeeding to continue for up to two years after the first six months of life, supplemented with the right complementary foods.
When they return to work after maternity leave, many working mothers find it challenging to follow the WHO’s advice. Because of this, some working mothers are forced to start feeding their infants formula in feeding bottles at a young age, contrary to WHO’s directive.
The infant is at a significant risk of contracting an infection as a result of the unclean handling and preparation of the baby formula.
As the mothers return to work earlier to be involved in their occupations that provide them with revenue at the end of the month, it becomes harder for them to continue breastfeeding their newborns.
According to experts, breastfeeding benefits both the mother and the child since it provides all the essential nutrients in the right amounts, lowers the risk of type 2 diabetes, and guards against allergies, illness, and obesity among others.
The World Breastfeeding Week (WBW), which was held this year from August 1 to August 7 with the theme, “Making Impact with Working Parents,” urges for immediate action to support working mothers who want to breastfeed their babies.
The purpose of the annual event is to raise awareness of the value of nursing, support and promote breastfeeding, and enhance both the mother and baby’s health.
According to the WHO’s directive, this year’s theme was “breastfeeding and work.” This gave advocates a strategic chance to promote crucial maternity rights that support breastfeeding, such as maternity leave that lasts at least 18 weeks and ideally longer than six months, as well as workplace accommodations after this time.
For women to be able to breastfeed for as long as they would like to, these are significant challenges. According to the WHO, more than half a billion working mothers do not receive the most basic maternity benefits, and many more are left alone when they return to work.
There have been proposals to extend maternity leave from three to six months, but there is concern that this could cause serious issues for women because some employers might not think it necessary to hire young women out of concern that their time spent at home while on paid maternity leave will be too long.
However, studies have shown that infants who were exclusively breastfed for the first six months of life and who were fed foods with the proper balance of nutrients from six months to two years of age have a higher chance of surviving, performing better in school, and being more productive throughout their lives.
The Spectator thinks that all employers should prioritise providing nursing mothers with a comfortable work environment because doing so will be good for both the mother and the child as well as the overall business.
Mothers who continue nursing after going back to work must therefore have the support of their employers. Employers have a lot of power to foster a culture that values breastfeeding mothers.
Until the child is roughly six months old, mothers who are returning to work should be permitted to bring their infants along with a babysitter to work. The mother will be better able to concentrate on her work, feel less stressed, and perform better at work as a result.
To ensure that breastfeeding is feasible for all working mothers and to support this year’s campaign theme, “Let’s make breastfeeding and work, work!” the government must mandate that companies provide nursing mothers with office space.
Some women choose not to have children, while others want children but are unable to do so because of uncontrollable circumstances.
Due to social expectations, childless women endure anxiety, loneliness, isolation, and even low self-esteem.
Their problems are made worse by the fact that they are labelled as barren. Owing to their current circumstances, individuals turn to a variety of treatments, including assisted reproductive care, in the hopes that eventually their desires would be fulfilled.
Thankfully, some have been successful and have had multipla children, while others have given up and resorted to adoption as a last choice.
However, there is good news for childless women whose circumstances are beyond their control: the nation’s first intrauterine insemination (IUI) quadruplets have been delivered, offering them hope.
IUI is a common fertility treatment where healthy sperm are collected, ‘washed’ and concentrated in a laboratory, and then directly inserted into a woman’s uterus around ovulation using a thin catheter to help sperm reach the egg for fertilisation, often used for unexplained infertility, cervical issues, or mild male factor infertility, and is less invasive than IVF.
This breakthrough occurred at the Walking Egg Medical and Fertility Centre at Pokuase in Accra, where a 30-year-old surrogate mother delivered a set of quadruplets, a rare surrogacy success that has brought renewed attention to assisted reproductive care in Ghana.
According to our reporter who witnessed the delivery, the babies-two boys and two girls- were delivered through a caesarean section in the early hours of Tuesday at 36 weeks and weighed an average of 2.5 kilogrammes each, a weight doctors say was healthy for a multiple pregnancy.
The Spectator is filled with joy and applauds the Medical Director of the Centre, Dr Nana Yaw Osei, for this great feat which will give hope to women and bring joy to many families.
Describing the moment of delivery, he added, “I was in tears in the theatre. It reminded me why I chose this profession.”
Hear him, “Unlike IVF which could result in multiple babies, this is “possibly the first IUI leading to quadruplets in Ghana.”
He explained that IUI is not planned to result in multiple births adding that “this outcome was left entirely to nature.”
Again, he revealed that “With IUI, you introduce prepared sperm into the uterus and have no control over how many eggs fertilized.”
The revelation is reassuring therefore we encourage couples to plan surrogacy arrangement as in this case the intended mother had lost her uterus during surgery to remove fibroids, making it medically impossible for her to carry a pregnancy.
Dr Osei again indicated that surrogacy, though still widely misunderstood, is recognised under the Registration of Births and Deaths Act, 2020 (Act 1027).
Although there have been concerns commonly associated with multiple pregnancies, Dr Osei noted that the surrogate experienced no major complications, and the delivery was smooth.
The good news is that “Paediatric assessments conducted after birth confirmed that all four babies are healthy.”
We therefore urge couples to consider surrogacy which is restoring hope to women who have lost the ability to carry a child.
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Dear Editor,
I want to use your respected platform to commend the police administration for the swoops that resulted in the arrest of members of some gangs that operates in Accra and other parts of the country.
These are notorious criminals that are always hell-bent to make life difficult for people.
We may be new in 2026 but it looks like these criminals are not ready to change. In less than two weeks into the New Year, the police has already busted several gang members with dangerous weapons in their possession.
It started in Accra with the arrest of 16 suspected individuals who were involved in various criminal cases including daylight robbers, phone snatching, residential robberies, impersonation and many others.
Following that was the seizure of suspected substances believed to be Indian Hemp in the North Tongu District of the Volta region.
Again, the Greater Accra and Eastern Regional Commands also collaborated well to smash a highway robbery syndicate with seven of the members arrested.
The last I can recount for the first month of the year was the interception of 1,613 parcels of suspected narcotics drugs by the Tema Police Command.
All of these goes to speak about the good work the police is doing to make life comfortable and violence –free for Ghanaians.
Without this commitment from the force, a lot of these activities would not have happen. They did all of these at the peril of their lives.
It is my hope that those arrested would be prosecuted and be made to face the full rigors of the law.
Nana Yaw Amankwaa,
Ofankor
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