This August we are celebrating National Breastfeeding Month recognizing the strength of families, the power of community, and the policies that make breastfeeding possible. This year’s National Breastfeeding Month theme, RISE: Resilience, Interdependence, Self-Determination, and Empowerment, reminds us that no family should have to navigate their feeding journey alone. 

Breastfeeding doesn’t happen in a vacuum. Families’ ability to meet their breastfeeding goals is shaped by the support they receive, the healthcare they can access, and the policies that either open doors or create barriers. At MomsRising, we know breastfeeding is about so much more than nutrition. It is about equity, dignity, and ensuring every family has the opportunity to meet their own infant feeding goals with the support they deserve.

Many parents want to breastfeed, but face challenge after challenge in trying to do so. In the United States, four out of five mothers start out breastfeeding, yet fewer than half are still breastfeeding at six months postpartum.

Why?

Families continue to tell us the same story. They aren’t lacking commitment. They are lacking support.

Too many parents are forced back to work before breastfeeding is established because they don’t have access to paid family and medical leave. Others struggle to find affordable lactation care, breastfeeding education, or the supplies they need. Families shouldn’t have to fight so hard to get the support they need. Yet too often, the very systems designed to help, create unnecessary barriers.

Right now, one in four women return to work within just two weeks of giving birth. That’s before they’ve had time to recover from childbirth, bond with their baby, or establish breastfeeding. And when challenges arise, professional lactation support is often difficult to access or unaffordable, especially for families already facing financial hardship.

Today, those barriers are becoming even greater.

Recent cuts to Medicaid and ongoing threats to maternal health funding put millions of families at risk of losing critical pregnancy and postpartum care, including access to lactation support. Medicaid currently covers more than 40% of births in the United States and serves as a lifeline for families throughout pregnancy, birth, and the postpartum period. Weakening these investments means fewer healthcare providers, more hospital closures, and even less access to care - particularly in rural communities, where more than one-third of U.S. counties already lack a birthing hospital, birth center, or obstetric provider.

And these barriers are not experienced equally.

Black, Indigenous, Latino, Asian American, Native Hawaiian, Pacific Islander, military, rural, and other historically underserved families continue to face disproportionate obstacles.  These inequities contribute to unacceptable disparities in maternal and infant health outcomes and make it even harder for families to receive the support they deserve.

The good news? We know what families need to thrive!

When parents have the time to heal, the healthcare they can count on, nutritious food on the table, and support from their workplaces and communities, they are more likely to meet their breastfeeding goals. That means investing in paid family and medical leave, protecting Medicaid and WIC, expanding access to lactation care, and ensuring every family can receive culturally responsive care.

These aren’t luxuries. They are the building blocks of healthier families and stronger communities.

Supporting breastfeeding isn’t just good for babies and parents, it’s good for the economy. When families are able to meet recommended breastfeeding goals, the United States could save nearly $13 billion every year in preventable healthcare costs while improving health outcomes for both parents and children.

Join Us Throughout National Breastfeeding Month to celebrate the many communities leading the way toward a future where every family has the support they need to thrive. We’ll be sharing our members’ stories, highlighting solutions, and advocating for the policies that make breastfeeding possible.

National Breastfeeding Month 2026 Theme: RISE: Resilience, Interdependence, Self-Determination, and Empowerment

August 1–7: World Breastfeeding Week Theme: Breastfeeding for a Sustainable Start in Life: Strengthen What Works

National WIC Breastfeeding Week

August 8–14: Indigenous Milk Medicine Week Theme: We Keep the Fires Lit: Rising Through Milk Medicine 

August 15–21: Asian American, Native Hawaiian, and Pacific Islander Breastfeeding Week 2026 Theme: (to be announced)

August 22–24: Military Lactation Celebration 2026 Theme: (to be announced)

August 25–31: Black Breastfeeding Week Theme: We All We Got

September 1–7: Workplace Lactation Week Theme: Work. Pump. Advance. Empowering the modern parent.

September 8-14: Lactancia Latina / Semana de la Lactancia Latina 2026 Theme: (to be announced)

Haven’t shared your story?  You can do so now! Snap a photo and tag us @MomsRising and use #NBMRisers26.

Together we rise - for our babies, for our bodies, for our future! Let’s make sure no parent is left behind.