The paper attempts to show the relationship between reproductive plans of Poles in reproductive age and their use of methods of preventing pregnancy. There has been carried out a reinterpretation of the results of a sexuality study from 2011 of a representative sample of 3206 adult Poles. There have also been used some of the results obtained in the previous edition of the survey, realised in 2005. It has been established, among other things, that almost half of the respondents plan to have another child in the future; the reproductive plans of the respondents have been differed by many socio-demographic variables as well as variables describing being in a relationship and sexual activity of the respondents; nearly three quarters of respondents who started a regular sex life used some method of contraception; there has been a favourable change in the use of methods of preventing pregnancy – hormonal medicines and condoms are used more frequently; unreliable methods (natural methods and coitus interruptus) are still relatively frequently used; there has been a radical reduction in concerns about unplanned procreation.

In this paper, we investigate the significance of health in the fertility choices made by women in Poland. We use data from the first wave of the Polish “Generations and Gender Survey” (GGS-PL), which was conducted at the turn of 2010 and 2011. We verify whether women who are disabled or who experience health problems limit their childbearing intentions. In our analyses, we use four different indicators for health. Our results suggest that all four might be important when planning a child in the subsequent three-year period. Nevertheless, our multivariate analyses indicate that only women’s self-rated health remains significant, if age, parity and marital status are controlled for.

Przygotowanie do wydania elektronicznego publikacji - zadanie finansowane w ramach umowy Nr 780/P-DUN/2017 ze środków Ministra Nauki i Szkolnictwa Wyższego przeznaczonych na działalność upowszechniającą naukę.

There has been a lot of changes in the provision of care for women during the perinatal period and newborns since the early 90s past century. These changes are an example occurring in parallel to the process of medicalization and the tendency to demedicalization.

The aim of this paper is to analyse these changes from the perspective of the theory of medicalization. In this article we analyse three effects of medicalization: increasing number of unjustified medical interventions, ignoring the needs of childbearing women and reducing the role of midwives.

I assert that we observe two contradictory tendencies. On the one hand, the medicalization of perinatal care is promoted by physicians. On the other hand, the demedicalization has its advocates among women and midwives. The question then arises whether these tendencies are exclusive or they are an example of democratization in the field of perinatal care, which are increasingly influenced by active in civil society, various pressure groups.

Breastfeeding is the healthiest way to feed newborns and infants. Breast milk is a unique biological fluid, a source of nutrients, immune factors and bacterial flora. Although we know breast milk is one of the factors influencing bacterial flora of the newborn's gastrointestinal tract, the diversity of factors affecting the composition of the microbiota and the biological role of bacteria in human milk is poorly understood. There are several potential factors that influence the composition of the flora of breast milk: immunological disorder of the mother, her diet, antibiotic treatments, birth type, and lactation duration. Currently, there are three known hypothesis about how milk becomes colonized: bacterial transfer from the mother's intestines (endogenous road), colonization after exposure to the bacteria in the birth canal during delivery and the transfer of bacteria from the skin to the breast during breastfeeding. Further research is needed to confirm the validity of the presented hypotheses