Florida’s First Milk Bank

The Edyth Bush Charitable Foundation recently invested $50,000 to help establish Florida’s first milk bank, Mothers’ Milk Bank of Florida.
The grant will assist in setting up a statewide headquarters and processing laboratory for a human milk bank in Orlando. Currently, there are only 15 milk banks in the United States. The mission of Mothers’ Milk Bank is to promote health and healing by collecting, processing and distributing donor human milk by physician prescription to premature and ill, hospitalized infants whose mothers are unable to meet their needs.
“Having donor milk available will demonstrate the value of human milk, encourage mothers to breast feed, provide needed milk until the mother’s milk is available, and improve the health of babies from infancy and beyond,” Milk Bank Executive Director Karen Kesler says.
Currently, donated milk is shipped overnight from Colorado. Mothers’ Milk Bank of Florida will not only supply local hospital and other hospitals within the state, but it will also supply milk to other states that don’t have milk banks.