New breastfeeding legislation makes pumping at work more inclusive

Accordion to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, three out of four mothers in the U.S. start out breastfeeding. However, nearly one in four women of childbearing age were not covered under the 2010 Break Time for Nursing Mothers Act, which requires employers to provide reasonable break time and a private, non-bathroom space for breastfeeding employees to pump during the work day.

The Economic Policy Institute estimated that more than one million Black women, 976,000 Hispanic women, 825,000 Asian women, more than six million white women, and 185,000 women of other races were excluded from the 2010 act.

To remedy that gap that stemmed from a provision that deemed that workers who are exempt from the overtime protections of the Fair Labor Standards Act are also exempt from the break time protections for nursing mothers, President Joe Biden signed into law the PUMP for Nursing Mothers Act (PUMP Act). The law, which Biden signed on Dec. 29, 2022, expands workplace protections for employees with a need to express breast milk. 

With this expansion, millions more employees, including teachers and nurses, are provided the right to break time and space to pump breast milk at work. The PUMP Act also makes it possible for workers to file a lawsuit to seek monetary remedies in the event that their employer fails to comply, and clarifies that pumping time must be paid if an employee is not completely relieved from duty.

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“Being able to have that time means that lactating parents, who are choosing to pump, can provide the best life that they can for their child themselves,” said Christina Cook, a doctoral student at Georgia Southern University. 

“Some of that relates to health benefits like asthma reduction and certain types of cancers as well for both mother and child, and it, again, it's very human-rights centered.”

The law received wide support from the U.S. Senate and the House, indicating that the U.S. is working toward being more inclusive, Cook said. 

“One of the things I would love to see is not referring to it as breastfeeding or mothers or women in general, but as chestfeeding, or lactating parents, or employees who are going to give birth, or childbearing because not everyone who can give birth or who does breastfeed or chestfeed identifies as a woman. So we think that's very important for us to recognize.”

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In Savannah, local breastfeeding advocates are part of an initiative supported by the CDC’s Racial & Ethnic Approaches to Community Health (REACH) grant to highlight barriers to breastfeeding and help make Savannah and Chatham County a breastfeeding/chestfeeding family-friendly community by increasing spaces and assisting local businesses in adopting or strengthening company-wide policies. 

While the legislation won’t truly go into effect until April 28, 2028, due to a 120-day enforcement provision delay, Cook said one of the things employers can do to prepare is to check to see whether or not they have a location policy and if that policy follows new guidelines. For employees, she encouraged them to work collaboratively with their employers about their needs.

Cook also encouraged people who need guidance on the new legislation to reach out to the team at the Jiann-Ping Hsu College of Public Health at Georgia Southern University.