Severe shortage of nursing rooms leaves breastfeeding mothers with nowhere to go

One mother walks an entire mall to find the only nursing room to pump, only to be stopped and questioned by security about why she is there. Many breastfeeding mothers say public spaces for nursing and pumping are severely inadequate — the one or two that exist are often occupied or treated as a break room, so when the need is real there is nowhere to go.

The structural gap is that local malls, stations and public facilities have long scored low on being mother-and-baby friendly, with no standards for the number, location or management of nursing rooms; venue managers, on one hand wanting to stop misuse and on the other having no clear guidance, end up leaving mothers in genuine need to be challenged, or even directed to use a disabled toilet. Behind the policy slogans encouraging childbirth, the gap in basic nursing and infant-care facilities forms a hidden daily strain on working mothers and mothers out and about.