The recent debate over whether breastfeeding athletes would be allowed to bring their nursing children to the Tokyo Olympics has dramatized the choices that confront working mothers of young children.
After petitions from athletes including U.S. marathon runner Aliphine Tuliamuk and soccer player Alex Morgan, the Tokyo Olympic committee eased a ban on family members attending the Games to allow nursing children to come with their mothers. It nonetheless upheld onerous conditions, having children stay separately outside the Olympic Village in strict quarantine in hotel rooms. Under those circumstances, athletes such as Spanish synchronized swimmer Ona Carbonell traveled to Tokyo without their babies. Such separation not only imposes short-term physical and emotional challenges, it has the potential to disrupt a nursing relationship in the long term.
The Tokyo Olympic committee opted to restrict family members in the context of the unique challenges posed by the coronavirus pandemic. Yet the incident is a potent example of how working parents, and particularly nursing parents of young children, are routinely overlooked in policymaking and have carried an additional burden during the pandemic. Despite a half-century of feminist activism on behalf of working parents, policymakers still fail to consider their unique needs. While this is true nearly everywhere, it is particularly striking in the United States, where support for working parents remains extremely limited.
