Association of economic status with breastfeeding rates in Northern Iran

Objective: to assess the breast-feeding condition based on economic status among primary school children and comparison between turkman and non-turkman ethnic groups in northern iran in 2010. methods: this was a descriptive, cross-sectional and retrospective research study, carried out on 6882 primary school children (4157=non-turkman and 2725=turkman) from 112 school of urban and villages in the north of iran. the schools and students were chosen by multistage sampling (cluster and random sampling). breast- feeding was categorized based on world health organization classification. results: breast-feeding during the first 6 postpartum months and two postpartum years was found in 5.8 and 57.1% of children. breast-feeding during the two postpartum years was significantly 12.5% more in turkman ethnic group than non-turkman ethnic group (p=0.001) but breast-feeding only for the first 6 postpartum months was 1.9% in turkman ethnic group less than in non-turkman ethnic group (p=0.002). there was a negative significant association between economic status and breast-feeding during the two postpartum years in both ethnic groups (p=0.001) and there was more breast feeding in the first 6 postpartum months in turkman ethnic group. conclusion: breast-feeding rate in turkman ethnic group is more common than non-turkman ethnic group. there is an inverse relationship between economic status and breast-feeding duration with a considerable trend in turkman ethnic group.