ABSTRACT
“Breast-feeding is an integral part of the reproductive process, the natural and ideal way of feeding the infant and a unique biological and emotional basis for child development. The social organization associated with Homo sapiens could avoid that: the young of a woman who was unable to breast-feed could be fed by some other lactating woman in the tribe, and no doubt wet-nursing has been available in human society almost since such a society evolved. The measurement of milk quality, from analysis of samples, is similarly unsatisfactory. The breasts enlarge in pregnancy much more in young women than older women, and that is obvious clinically. The degree of enlargement presumably reflects the amount of glandular tissue present; it correlates closely with milk output. When breast milk is compared to the milk of other mammals its average gross composition is obviously suited to the mature human infant.
