Breastfeeding parents across America won a major victory last December, when the Providing Urgent Maternal Protections for Nursing Mothers Act—also called the PUMP Act—passed both houses of Congress and was signed into law.
The legislation, which went into effect at the end of April, expands protections to 9 million women to have a clean and private space to express breastmilk at work. Workers who had previously been excluded from the federal protections, including employees with managerial duties or those who work on commission, are now covered. The legislation also makes it easier for women to sue their employers if they’re not compliant with the regulations. But the final version of the law still excludes an important sector of the workforce: airline flight attendants and pilots.
Because nursing can bestow health benefits on both mothers and children, the American Academy of Pediatrics recommends exclusive breastfeeding for newborns for the first six months if possible; the group also introduced new guidelines in 2022 to support continued breastfeeding for two years or possibly longer, if desired by both the mother and child. While lactating, women typically need to express breastmilk around every two to three hours. If they can’t do so for long stretches, it could lead to pain, infection, and a dwindling milk supply that leaves them unable to nurse their babies. This means that flight attendants and pilots returning to work after maternity leave need to pump while on the job, whether that’s on an aircraft during a long flight or in the airport.
But when the PUMP Act was being negotiated in the Senate, US airlines fought to have flight crews removed from the legislation (other airline employees who work on the ground were included). The lobbying group for the seven largest US carriers, Airlines for America, said in a statement that this was because its carriers “already voluntarily” provide time and accommodations for pumping and “in-flight crew duties are inherently unique.” They also brought up safety concerns. “The ability to perform both routine and emergency safety functions throughout the entire duration of a flight is fundamental to the jobs of both pilots and flight attendants.”
The airline group's stance implies that crew taking 15 to 20 minutes to pump on board would somehow put fliers in jeopardy, but flight attendants and breastfeeding experts say pumping on a plane is perfectly safe and poses no harm to passengers or crew. “Expressing milk absolutely can be, and in many cases already is, done safely aboard aircraft during non-critical phases of flight,” says Cheryl Lebedevitch, senior policy and communications manager at the U.S. Breastfeeding Committee. “Safety protocols are already in place to ensure flight attendants can step away from their duties when the plane is at cruise altitude to attend to other necessary physiological or personal needs, like using the restroom. This can easily be applied to lactation. If needed, crew members can cease milk expression in a matter of seconds, so there is no reason why they should not have the opportunity and protection to breastfeed their babies, as recommended by health authorities.”
While there are creative solutions to be used in a pinch, without an official policy flight attendants and pilots are left in the stressful situation of not knowing if they’ll be able to fit in lactation time while working. “Flight attendants are already pumping and expressing milk in flight even though the airlines have not provided any official breaks for pumping,” says a fact sheet provided by the Association of Flight Attendants–CWA, the largest flight attendant union in the US That's because crew can't always just wait until they're on the ground: 88 percent of nursing flight attendants did not have sufficient pumping time between flights, according to a joint study by the AFA and another crew union.