Health Equity Pilot Project Case Study: Romania: Protection of breastfeeding for health of infants and young children especially in vulnerable families

It is not just the lowest socioeconomic status women who suffer a disproportionate burden of obesity. A social gradient exists in most EU countries whereby each socioeconomic group is relatively more obese compared with the next socioeconomic group above them in the social spectrum. Moreover these inequities appear to be widening, thus creating a steeper gradient. Therefore government action to reduce this gradient requires strategies which combine both universal and targeted measures that offers universal protection to all while giving extra protection to those with greatest need.

For example the existing EU inequities in the low prevalence of breastfeeding and high prevalence of obesity mean that their negative consequences disproportionately affect low socioeconomic families. These families are less likely to be upwardly socially mobile and more likely to be unemployed or suffer absenteeism from work due to ill health. Strengthening national legislation to curtail marketing of baby food products will give universal protection while helping especially those who are most susceptible to spend their limited financial resources because of sophisticated marketing strategies.

Once transferred into national law and assuming its implementation is monitored by independent bodies, a national law provides one of the most effective and sustainable measures to protect public health and reduce health inequalities.