iStock/Thinkstock(NEW YORK) — Teachers across the country are advocating for the right to pump breast milk at work.
After discovering a loophole that leaves salaried workers unprotected under federal law, teachers from states including Texas and Florida are fighting for the right to pump at work.
The Affordable Care Act currently protects working mothers with hourly wages, but the law does not require employers to provide time and space for pumping for women in salaried positions.
Anna Johnson-Smith, a former teacher in Texas, told The Washington Post she felt like she had to choose between her teaching career and her child when her principal denied her request for a small break every afternoon to pump.
“A 15-minute break was all I was asking for,” Johnson-Smith told The Washington Post. “We’ve come so far in our society in so many ways, and here in 2015, we’re still fighting for the right to provide breast milk for our babies.”
High school teacher Monica Howell told The Washington Post when she returned to work after having her baby last year, she was denied a request for a break to pump after the first class of the day by her assistant principal. Her principal later reversed the decision, but it wasn’t enough. Some days she couldn’t find someone to watch her classroom and she would have no time to pump.
Howell’s union, the United Teachers of Dade, provided a new contract for Fall 2014 where new mother teachers were given the right to have “reasonable” time to pump in a private space.
According to the National Library of Medicine, women without medical problems should give their babies breast milk for at least the first six months after birth. Women who don’t pump their breasts or breastfeed may feel painful engorgement or plugged ducts and infection.
Copyright © 2015, ABC Radio. All rights reserved.
