World Breastfeeding Week 2026

For World Breastfeeding Week (1–7 August 2026) and we are celebrating the incredible teams who go above and beyond for mums, bubs and families.

This year’s theme, Breastfeeding for a Sustainable Start in Life: Strengthen What Works, is about looking at the big picture and how active engagement with mums and families helps us to track the progress breastfeeding awareness.

We can also measure how implementation initiatives improve nutrition, food security and poverty reduction (particularly for families experiencing geographic, financial or service access barriers) and use this to continue building on our successes through lessons learned.

Since commencing in August 2021 the WA Country Health Service (WACHS) Telehealth Lactation Service has gone from strength-to-strength, growing into a vital service supporting families across country WA.

A highly specialised and close-knit team, which comprises of clinical midwives and International Board Certified Lactation Consultants in addition to administrative staff, supports women during pregnancy and up to seven weeks postpartum via telehealth or phone.

The service is available with no out-of-pocket cost for those who are Medicare eligible and can be self-referred or referred by a healthcare provider – with a WA Health e-referral preferred when available. 

The service also gives mums and families access to Breastfeeding Masterclasses, which are delivered weekly in virtual sessions.

Interested in accessing the service? The WACHS Telehealth Lactation Service online referral form is available here.  

For more information on masterclasses and the service the team can be contacted by email wachslactationsupportservice@health.wa.gov.au or by phone (08) 9724 0501.

Feeback from the community and success stories

Two grateful mums who were recently supported by the service provided some heartfelt feedback – thanking the team and reflecting on how it helped them navigate those first, challenging weeks of motherhood, the experience of which is still having a positive impact many months later.

“I was initially sceptical about video support. Within days, I had confidence. The genuine care and passion really shine through. You are one in a million.”

“Thirteen months on and still breastfeeding. We never needed to supplement. There’s no way we would have come this far without your support. You are angels working little miracles every day.”

The service continues to build support systems for families across regional WA with more than 7,000 lactation consultations facilitated in the past five years.

Impressively more than 240 consultations were facilitated in June 2026 alone.

Clinical Midwifery Specialist – Lactation Sam Foster said the success stories didn’t end there.

“Earlier this year staff from our Nursing and Midwifery teams published their ‘Dialling in for breastfeeding success, a mixed-methods approach to explore remote stakeholders’ research paper through Rural and Remote Health,” Sam said.

“The paper investigates consumer and clinician perspectives of using telehealth to access or provide perinatal education along with clinical service delivery in rural WA.

“It feeds directly into the World Breastfeeding Week’s call to action to heed the lessons we learn through active consumer feedback.

“I am immensely proud of the team – their dedication to the health, wellbeing and education of WA mums and families does not go unnoticed.” 

Additionally, staff are supported through virtual training initiatives – Breastfeeding Mini-Series and an antenatal educational program ‘Fourth Trimester, Breastfeeding and Early Parenting’.