Mother is banned from breast-feeding in surgery over health and safety concerns

A mother was told she could not breast-feed her baby in a doctor's surgery, because it was in breach of health and safety rules.

Terri-Ann Barnes, 23, went into the to the practice to shelter from a heavy rain-storm and tend to her hungry three-month old son Christian.

After asking the permission of the receptionist at the Heavitree Health Centre in Exeter, Devon, she fed the little boy in the empty waiting room.



But then, after Miss Barnes finished, a nurse approached her and said that she had broken surgery rules by feeding the child in the building because she was not a registered patient and had not properly signed in.

Miss Barnes said: "When a baby wants feeding they can't wait. If you can't breast feed in a doctor's surgery where can you?"

Len Young, the health centre's practice manager, said that health and safety guidelines advise that anybody waiting in the surgery should be properly registered and checked in so the practice has a record of who is in the building.