Pulse.

a daily field guide to health research that matters

◆ Console

‹ Mon · 29 Jun 2026
Near-term implementable finding

Breastfeeding and risk of maternal type 2 diabetes: a prospective cohort study of 280 000 women in China.

Breastfeeding independently lowers mothers' long-term type 2 diabetes risk in a dose-dependent way, supporting this simple preventive strategy at population scale.

Very large prospective cohort provides robust evidence that breastfeeding independently reduces long-term maternal T2DM risk in a dose-dependent manner in China, home to the world's largest T2DM burden. Findings support breastfeeding promotion as a scalable, low-cost preventive public health strategy.

What the study was

Study design
Prospective cohort study
Population
Chinese women; n=283,855; median 11.8 years follow-up; China Kadoorie Biobank
Sample size
283855
Category
Prevention
Maturity
Validated
Journal
BMJ open

Why it surfaced

Massive prospective cohort (n=283,855); dose-response breastfeeding-T2DM relationship; open access BMJ Open; public health relevance in world's highest-burden T2DM nation.

A plain-language summary of published research — not medical advice. Talk to a clinician about your own care.