Baby Friendly Standards for Hospital-based children's services  

Following an open consultation period, we are pleased to publish the new UNICEF UK Baby Friendly standards for hospital-based children’s services

These new standards build upon those for maternity, neonatal, health visiting, children’s centres and universities and have been developed in response to calls from health professionals, voluntary sector workers and parents to improve care around infant feeding and relationship building. They are applicable to hospital-based children’s services, i.e. children’s wards within general hospitals and stand-alone children’s hospitals, as well as outpatient and accident and emergency departments that provide care for babies and children under one year of age.

We would like to extend our thanks to all who took part in the consultation process for these standards – your feedback and comments were very valuable. For a closer look at the new standards for hospital-based children’s services, download the overview document on this page.