Urgent help for the parents of children dependent on tube-feeding is being sought from MPs.
Photo: AFP / Neville Mountford-Hoare / AltoPress / PhotoAlto
A petition has been presented to Parliament's Health Select Committee by Jody Anderson, on behalf of the lobby group Tube Wean New Zealand and more than 4000 people.
Tube-feeding helps premature or sick babies to survive, but the group says children tend to become dependent and don't learn how to eat independently.
Ms Anderson - who tube-fed her child for three and a half years - said she wants more rapid weaning services made available.
"Tube-feeding is traumatic and tube-feeding beyond needing it is really hard for a parent to stomach, because all a parent wants is for their child to reach their potential."
Ms Anderson said long-term tube-feeding was also an unneccessary burden on the taxpayer; more than 600 children were tube-fed in 2013.
