Articles and Books

The current pandemic and the concerns of vertical transmission of SARS-CoV-2 have contributed to increasing the rate of breastfeeding interruption. This tendency has been associated with negative effects on the well-being of lactating mothers and their infants. The aim of this review is to summarize the evidence on the strategies to support breastfeeding during the COVID-19 pandemic and on the safety of breastfeeding during a SARS-CoV-2 infection or after COVID-19 vaccination.

Studies have shown that aside from its health effects on babies, breastfeeding also positively impacts maternal health. Breastfeeding has been strongly associated with decreased maternal risk of type 2 diabetes, breast and ovarian cancers .Meanwhile, the definite link between breastfeeding and cardiovascular diseases (CVD) has not been fully established. This systematic review and meta-analysis aim to address this gap, as it presents the association between breastfeeding and maternal risk for CVD events, including coronary heart disease (CHD), stroke, and fatal CVD .

Human milk oligosaccharides (HMOs) have important biological functions for a healthy development in early life. This study aimed to investigate gut maturation effects of an infant formula containing five HMOs (20-fucosyllactose, 20,3-di-fucosyllactose, lacto-N-tetraose, 30- sialyllactose, and 60-sialyllactose). 

Thise Editorial highlights middle childhood and adolescence, between 5 and 19 years of age, as a transformative period in the lifecycle. These “school-age years” bridge early life and adulthood through significant and specific physiologic, somatic, cognitive, and psychosocial bursts of change.

The maximum rate of bone mass accumulation occurs during the school-age years and plateaus in late adolescence, after which little incremental accrual will occur.

School age is also a critical period of brain growth and development. By 12 years of age, brain and grey matter growth reach final adult size, and the brain tissue undergoes a great increase in pruning of “less utilized” neuronal synapses, which significantly increases brain efficiency.

While a significant number of reports document poor diets in significant segments of young children and adults, such data is scant for children in middle childhood (5-11years of age) and adolescence (12-19 years of age).

Standardized methodological approaches have greatly focused on infants and adults, and only recently have they been assessed and applied to adolescent populations. This is particularly true in reference to predictors of weight and adiposity and their relationship to nutrient intake and diet composition.