When can I stop sterilising bottles?

[LauraKB]

Hi All

At what age can I stop sterilising bottles and just give them a good wash in hot soapy water (which I do prior to sterilising at the moment)?

Depends who you ask. Some people never sterilise and do the hot soapy water thing from the start. Some people use the dishwasher too.

Yeah I stopped sterilising when DD was about 2 1/2 months. Not progressed to using dishwasher yet because we eat alot of tomato based stuff and I dont fancy orange tinted bottles!

Usually from when you wean, you are not sterilising the spoon, dished and food.
But some people think good cleaning form the start is enough, some people still serilised everything till they are 2...

Never sterilised, except newly bought stuff got a 5 minute boil. Just washed in hot soapy water and airdried.

Ok dokey, then. DD is 8 months, so it looks like we don't need to cart the steriliser on holiday with us!

When they start touching everything and putting their hands straight into their mouths.

Lol, CoteDAzur you have a point. She has developed a rather unfortunate 'this dirty nappy looks like a good thing to try and chew on' think of late. You have to get it in the nappy bag fast

I tihnk the official advice is 12 momths.

Seehere

I know that's not 'official' but it's a start.

Not official advice but from my POV it would depend on how I was making/storing the feeds. I agree that past 6 months when they are putting everything in mouth anyway then the need to sterilise reduces. However if milk was going to be put in the bottles in advance and stored for hours/day then I would be more inclined to sterilise as any bacteria could multiply in the milk over the time stored. If it was to put milk in and feed there and then I would not bother sterilising.