Breastfeeding Legislative Update - Mississippi

Miss. Gov. Signs Bill Requiring Designated Places for Women Breast-Feeding at Child-Care Facilities:

Mississippi Gov. Haley Barbour (R) this week signed a bill (SB 2419) that requires child-care facilities to designate a suitable place for women to breast-feed their infants or use a breast pump, the AP/Biloxi Sun Herald reports. Under the law, the location -- which cannot be a bathroom stall -- must have a comfortable chair, an electrical outlet and access to running water. Day care centers also are required to provide a refrigerator for women to store their pumped milk and must train employees how to handle it correctly, the law says. In addition, the law says that breast-feeding in a public place cannot be considered indecent exposure or disorderly conduct.

Oh yeah, that too.

It also allows any woman who is nursing an infant younger than age one to be exempt from jury duty and requires employers to allow a woman to use her lunch break or other designated break times to pump milk.

Looks like Mississippi did it all in one bill, instead of most states which needed to use four separate pieces of legislation to get the same effect.