Those who are breast-fed in infancy face lower risks of depression in their adulthoods, a fresh study by German researchers claimed.

A group of German researchers studied fifty-two adults, who were undergoing treatment for major depression, and compared them with more than one hundred healthy people who had never suffered depression.

Any subject, who was nursed for at least two weeks, was considered to have been breast-fed.

Findings showed that 73 per cent of those were never diagnosed with depression had been breast-fed during their infancies, while just 46 per cent of those who were diagnosed with depression were breast-fed.

However, the researchers also concluded that the length of the period for which a person had been breast-fed in his/her infancy didn’t make a difference in terms of the person’s depression risk.

MyHealthNewsDaily reported the study in an article on September 7, titled "Breast-Feeding in Infancy May Shield Adults from Depression."

Researchers say that breast-feeding has many benefits for the mother also. Breast-feeding normalizes blood sugar level, and helps mothers lose weight and water gained during pregnancy, and make them less prone to postpartum depression. It also suspends menses for a few months.