# WHO 2017: protecting, promoting and supporting breastfeeding in facilities providing maternity and newborn services

Guideline · id `maternal:guideline-who-2017-breastfeeding-in-facilities` · Maternal & Newborn Atlas · release `c7fb95f1d15a7d13` (public)

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Browse, life stage: Childbirth; Postpartum; Newborn  
Browse, care area: Breastfeeding and lactation  

## In plain language

The 2017 WHO guideline, with 15 numbered recommendations, on supporting breastfeeding in hospitals, maternity facilities and other facilities that care for mothers and newborns. It updates the Ten Steps to Successful Breastfeeding.

## Technical summary

WHO guideline, 2017, ISBN 978-92-4-155008-6, CC BY-NC-SA 3.0 IGO; the who.int page date is 2 November 2017 and the IRIS record gives the same date. 120 pages; the list of recommendations and the methods paragraphs were read, not the evidence tables. It updates and supersedes the 1989 Ten Steps to Successful Breastfeeding. Recommendation 3 (practical support to initiate and establish breastfeeding and manage common difficulties) is recorded as a recommendation and claim on the breastfeeding support page; Recommendation 1 (early skin-to-skin contact) and Recommendation 14 (antenatal counselling) are quoted as context. Whether a later edition replaces it was not checked. This guideline is an addition to the plan's list for the cluster, made so that the WHO recommendation record has a guideline to belong to.

## Connected pages

- Issuer (copyright line: World Health Organization 2017): World Health Organization (`maternal:who`)

## Provenance

Content hash: e50e0a7b7fe7706d064082cc3d4762557f58908cfe68bc30df39323dfaf04276
Last substantive edit: 2026-10-14
Evidence last checked: 2026-10-14