Wet nurses and breastfeeding in Zagreb through history – from the end of the nineteenth century until the end of World War II

Abstract

 The paper provides data on wet nurses and breastfeeding in the period from the end of the nineteenth century until the Second World War. At the end of the nineteenth century, wet nurses were employed for a salary that was not small at the time, indicating that such work was considered important. In this period, infants were often breastfed in the countryside, where they were cared for by foreign persons, sometimes without sufficient attention. Certain steps were taken to remedy this situation by some prominent physicians. Part of the work on infant protection involved the promotion of breastfeeding. This work was carried out in the City Chil- dren’s Ambulatory in Zagreb, which officially opened in 1908, and the Center for Social and Hygienic Work of Nurses, which started in 1930. Caring for the health of infants was also part of the preventive health policy of the Kingdom of Serbs, Croats and Slovenes (SHS), and work in this field continued in the future.