As demand for human milk grows, ministry to operate van for collecting surplus from mothers at home

The Ministry of Health and Food Safety in Nepal is introducing a mobile human milk collection service to address a critical shortage of breast milk for newborns in maternity and children’s hospitals.

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Demand for human milk for newborns is much higher than the collection. Since it is impractical for new mothers to travel a long distance to the hospital to donate milk, we have introduced the concept of a human milk bank.

A specialized van, equipped for safe transport under cold-chain storage, will be deployed in the Kathmandu valley. This mobile unit will visit mothers with surplus breast milk at their homes, facilitating donations that are currently difficult due to travel constraints. Lila Bikram Thapa, chief of the Nutrition Section at the Family Welfare Division of the Department of Health Services, highlighted that demand significantly outstrips collection, making this home-based collection concept essential.

The United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) is providing a state-of-the-art vehicle to operationalize the service within two months. The Paropakar Maternity and Women’s Hospital in Thapathali has been running a human milk bank since August 2022 with UNICEF's financial and technical support, but it struggles to meet the demand.

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Vulnerable infants, whose mothers are sick or died after giving birth or their breasts do not yield milk or critically ill newborns in neonatal intensive care units, premature babies with low birth weights need breast milk supplement.

Dr. Sailendra Bir Karmacharya, a senior pediatrician at the hospital, explained that vulnerable infants, including those whose mothers are ill, deceased, unable to produce milk, or critically ill newborns in intensive care, require breast milk supplements. Approximately 300 infants are admitted to the Thapathali hospital's neonatal intensive care unit monthly, with most needing breast milk. Other hospitals in the valley also rely on this bank.

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Since demand is excessively high and collection is low, we have been prioritising the infants as per the low weight and those critically ill to provide breast milk.

Doctors emphasize that breast milk is vital for premature babies and low-birth-weight infants. The milk collected is rigorously tested, pasteurized, and stored at minus 40 degrees Celsius. The Thapathali hospital, with 60 to 80 deliveries daily, is a primary collection point, but mothers are often discharged quickly, limiting in-hospital donations. The new mobile service aims to bridge this gap by making donation more accessible for mothers with excess milk.

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As breast milk cannot be manufactured, some new mothers have to donate it, and new mothers with surplus breast milk cannot visit the hospital for donation. So we have been preparing to