Women hold “nurse-in” for U.S. breast-feeding bill
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Dozens of mothers and babies held a pre-Mother’s Day “nurse-in” near the U.S. Capitol on Thursday to support legislation to make it easier for working women to breast-feed or pump milk for their babies on the job.
“Breast-feeding is natural and it has a health benefit to mothers and children,” said the legislation’s chief sponsor, New York Democratic Rep. Carolyn Maloney, trying to be heard above the din of young children.
Her bill would expand the 1978 Pregnancy Discrimination Act so a woman could not be fired or discriminated against in the workplace for pumping or nursing on breaks.
The legislation would also have the Food and Drug Administration set standards for breast pumps and give companies a tax credit if they help women nurse or pump milk at work.
Half of mothers with children under age 1 work outside the home, she said.
Maloney failed to get the bill passed in the previous Congress but in recent years she has succeeded in getting two other bills passed, one making it clear women can nurse babies without harassment on federal property including museums and national parks and the other encouraging breast-feeding under a federal nutrition program for the poor.
Her co-sponsor, Connecticut Republican Christopher Shays, said he got accustomed to seeing women nurse babies while he was a Peace Corps volunteer in the South Pacific, but recognized some American men were uncomfortable with public breast-feeding.
“Get a life,” he advised them, as the nursing moms cheered.
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