Vermont Business Magazine The U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) is recognizing 103 WIC clinics, among 10,000 nationally, with WIC Breastfeeding Awards of Excellence for work being done to help moms and babies successfully breastfeed. In Vermont, three clinics received awards:
- Middlebury District Office, Middlebury, VT, Elite- the sole Elite awardee in the nation, with 60% of moms fully or partially breastfeeding
- Vermont Department of Health, Brattleboro, VT, Premiere, with 52% of moms fully or partially breastfeeding
- White River Junction WIC, White River Junction, VT, Gold, with 56% of moms fully or partially breastfeeding
The Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants, and Children known as WIC is one of the nation’s 16 federal nutrition programs. WIC aims to safeguard the health of low-income women, infants, and children up to age 5 who are at nutrition risk by providing nutritious foods to supplement diets, information on healthy eating, breastfeeding promotion and support, and referrals to health care and social services.
WIC Breastfeeding Awards of Excellence are given at three levels of performance that build on one another: Gold, Premiere, and Elite. In Vermont, the awardee clinics are using peer counselors, a mom-to-mom mentorship, to provide prenatal and postpartum education and family support to clients, strengthening relations with local International Board-Certified Lactation Consultants to refer WIC clients and in Middlebury, working with its local hospital to offer breastfeeding support post discharge as well as growing its collaborations among doulas, visiting nurses and pediatricians.
“These awards highlight the importance of breastfeeding as the best source of nutrition for a baby’s first year of life, said USDA Food and Nutrition Service Regional Administrator Lizbeth Silbermann. With WIC serving about 40% of babies born in the country, local WIC program staff, who provide breastfeeding education and support to mothers, are key to helping moms that want to breastfeed do so successfully.”
More information about WIC can be found at www.fns.usda.gov/WIC.
Source: Boston. 8.21.2024. United States Department of Agriculture
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