Curious to know if you sterilised baby bottles etc or not?

[JellyBelly50]

Myself and a friend was talking about this earlier. She told me she only uses hot soapy water as she was told apparently by health visitor that it wasn’t super necessary. NHS says to do at 12 months although some stop at 6 months when they start putting everything in their mouth. What did you do?

I know not really an AIBU but I am curious to know if everyone else doesn’t sterilise

You have to remember that all this advice is aimed to cater to the lowest common denominator. So for those who don't wash their hands, or use soap to clean food and drink items, who just rinse in cold water. Who maybe don't even do that in-between feeds just reuse the same bottle......

I sterilised until on cows milk
Didn't take longer and better to be safe than sorry

Regardless though - the advice is based on research from huge numbers of children.

id be really interested to see this research and results, I wasn’t able to find any ( one study on 39 babies) as I do remember being told by health professional that there wasn’t this data available- thanks

Not really a thing when I had DD in the US, just hottest dishwasher setting. Then cold water in the formula powder in the powder too. An NHS midwife would probably have a fit but somehow she survived and is now 6! When I had my youngest in the UK I sterilised for the first couple of months as the dishwasher doesn’t get as hot.

I have a French friend who says the advice in France is that putting in dishwasher is fine.

I never bothered (after a few weeks with DS1) but they had almost zero formula.

It is true for healthy full term infants but it’s not exactly comparable because most people have a dishwasher with a sanitise setting plus heated dry so it’s recommended to do that instead. Also the CDC issues very specific guidelines bottle washing guidelines including for the teats so you can’t go wrong if you’re doing it by hand. Sterilising bottles is really just in case you missed any bits washing because left over old milk can grow really nasty bacteria. But if you can be totally confident they’re clean then there’s not a great deal of point to it I don’t think.

I breast fed but cups, teething rings etc I put in the dishwasher on pot wash

I think I sterilised until 12 months and put cups in the dishwasher after that.

Once DC1 was crawling I trotted out the "why do we bother sterilising everything when they literally chew random sticks off the ground?" cliche to a mate of mine who is a very sensible, very relaxed mum and in no way a classic MN hygiene obsessive, but who also has a PhD in biochemistry. She treated me to a snappy summary on the very specific germs which can grow in discarded formula in the corners of inadequately cleaned bottles, so I carried on sterilising.

I was told by paediatrician no need to sterilise for breast milk, but to sterilise if using formula until up to a year old.

This was well over a decade ago, and not UK.

Sterilised for around 6 months. By then they were crawling around sucking and eating pretty much anything, so thought it a bit daft after that.
Washed with hot soapy water after and rinsed with boiling water from the kettle.

Well yes, I can't imagine it would have been very pleasant sticking your boobs in the steamer!

It takes a lot more than that to make something sterile.

Bottles were sterilised until 6 months old and then we used hot soapy water.
Dummies stopped being sterilised about 3 months in.

We sterilised everything until 6 months when we watch her lick the dog.... felt a bit pointless after that! She seems happy and healthy enough 🤣

If she's anything like my daughter who also licks the dog, she will have the best immunity! Haha!

No

Ds wasn’t born in Uk. Sterilisation isn’t done here.
Also milk is magically fine to be made at 40 degrees here ( even Same brands as uk ie Hipp, Aptimal). If you go on the local sites you see the guidelines is to 40 degrees only so it’s warm, not a safely thing.

Ds was breastfed 99% of the time in the end, but when I asked midwife about formula to 70+ degrees and sterilising she thought I was bonkers.

see here, if you scroll down to dosing and prep
https://www.aptaclub.de/aptamil-produkte/biomilchnahrung/aptamil-organic-pre.html#accordion-2f325c57dc-item-dc1ba8679b

I always sterilised the bottles and teats for every use, in a Mothercare sterilising tank with Milton. Cheap, easy, fool proof.

That's correct. 9 babies over there died in 2021 due to contaminated formula, sterilising bottles lowers that risk.

We had a bowl of water with a milton tablet in it on the side by the sink - bottles got washed in the sink and popped into the milton and stayed there until they were next needed. Milton got emptied and refreshed every morning. At first, we used steam in the microwave but it was so much more hassel. The Tommy Tippee machine also got a full clean and sterilized every evening and the water temp checked in the morning (used to make up a fake bottle and test the hot shot of water). The temp was always above 70 degrees so we stopped doing that at about 9 months!

We stopped sterilizing at 12 months.

True, they use the dishwasher like I did when we lived there. I did use boiling water for bottles, made a days worth and stuck them in the fridge. Most friends just made it up cold with cold water or used pre mixed.

I did until 12 months. And toys. Fragile premature baby. Anyone remember this? https://www.dailypost.co.uk/news/north-wales-news/deadly-bug-in-water-2903317. I seem to recall some babies getting very ill because the water hadn't been boiled/bottles hadn't been sterilised.

Yes, I sterilized bottles, teats and dummies until they were just over 1 year old. A couple of friends did say don't bother they put everything in their mouths but I didn't want to take any chances.

I never sterilised anything, but i didnt feed formula.

I sterilised all bottles until they were 1

Never did the dummies or drinking cups of water though

I did but I was not realising some nooks and crannies for a while and they slowly clogged up so pleased I'd at least sterilised them!