The 2019 Global Big Latch On with Maternity Care Coalition Building Community Support, One Latch At A Time
In August 2nd, we were extremely honored to host the 5th annual Philadelphia-based Global Latch event during World Breastfeeding Week. Nearly 150 eager participants joined us at our registered location in Franklin Square to partake in the Big Latch On event in which babies and mothers all breastfeed synchronously around the world, while nearly 60,000 people attended the event globally. The goal of the event is to normalize breastfeeding and to protect, to promote, and to support the breastfeeding movement around the world.
As the host, Maternity Care Coalition (MCC) strives to make breastfeeding families feel valued and empowered. We also hope to normalize public breastfeeding and ensure our local community has access to breastfeeding support services and resources. In doing so, we invited other dedicated community organizations and companies that support and promote breastfeeding including, Philadelphia Health Department, Acelleron, Health Partners Plans, Healthy Children Project, Inc., Destination Maternity and many others.
We also facilitated an exhilarating discussion among the breastfeeding moms to openly discuss their daily experiences, highlights, and challenges with breastfeeding in a protected, positive environment. The experience was informative and enlightening for all and provided a strong sense of solidarity and a wonderfully unique and educating platform for everyone to better understand both the challenges and rewards of breastfeeding. Additionally, one of our Breastfeeding Champions performed a song, “I Know Who I Am, I Am Strong,” to honor the breastfeeding community. Attending moms loved the performance and the powerful, uplifting message of the song as it was an empowering moment for all.
Attendees, community partners, and MCC staff, brought passion, joy, warmth to this year’s Global Latch event. One Breastfeeding Champion had this to say, “As I listened to the moms share their stories, the connection of being women stood out to me. I love the amount of representation and diversity along with the variety of vendors that come to the event each year.”
At Maternity Care Coalition, we understand that collaboration and unity is absolutely vital to create change and make an impact to an ever-growing movement. Raising awareness about issues that are important for the communities we serve, especially when it comes to solidarity surrounding breastfeeding, creates an unbreakable bond between the women and families involved. We are proud of this event as it allowed us to do so. Finally, Representative Mary Isaacson, 175th District, who we learned is a breastfeeding supporter, dropped by for a surprise visit!
