Dirty water, best way to make a bottle...

[beckie222]

We have a few burst pipes in our area and as a result our water is brown and cloudy.
I need to make a bottle of formula, Am I best to use bottled boiled water or will the normal tap water boiled be ok?

TIA

You could phone whoever is your water board/authority and ask them....they're gonna know better than people on a talkboard

The water people will know whether the brown cloudiness is a sign of anything harmful - it's their job.

I'd use some bottled water myself, can never be too safe!

I already phoned the water company and they didn't have any advice for me?
Just thought I would ask in case it's a problem someone has encountered before.

Thanks

Would you drink the water?
Can you get to a shop and buy the prepared carton stuff? That's what I'd do, or use bottled water.

I'd use bottled tbh. Are you drinking the tap water?

The water company are a bit crap they arent they? Thats so silly, its their job to know

Personally i couldnt give my child brown water, but that is just based my own prejudices, could you use ready made formula/bottled water (there are specific brands that are allowed) until it clears up?

And if the water co. cant tell you its safe for making formula maybe they can pay for premixed formula?

We are using the water boiled for ourselves but just didn't know what to do for the bottle.
I know it's not a good idea to use bottled water for baby but just was wondering which would be the lesser of 2 evils IYKWIM.
Unfortunately I don't have any pre mixed cartons and no way of getting any tonight.

Thanks for all your posts.

I'd use the bottled water if it was me...but I'm in no way qualified to give that advice.

How old is the baby? That makes a bit of a difference I think.

Why can't you get any tonight? I'd consider this an emergency situation...is there no one who can pick some up for you?

I live overseas and all the babies (and children and adults) here drink bottled water all day every day.

I'd go with the bottled

My DD is 5 months.
We live in quite a rural area so difficult to get about in the evening.
I've gone with the bottled water for now as I figured it should be a lot better than the tap water at the minute.

i would use premixed if i had to. and i would complain that the water board can't tell you if the water is safe to drink!

Evian is the best brand to use if you need to use bottled water. The other bottled water in this country in general has too much sodium for babies to drink formula made with it all the time.

Go and buy some ready milk, failing that bottled. Do NOT ingest brown cloudy water.

from NHS website:

In the event of an interruption to your supply of tap water - for example, if the water supply is interrupted, or contaminated, by a flood - you should ideally use the water from your water tank, that should be supplied by the water company. However, if this is not available, you should use bottled water to prepare a formula feed.

Make sure that the water is brought to a 'rolling' boil and is left covered, to cool, for no more than half an hour. Use cooled boiled water, or bottled water, to cool the feed once it has been made up. Alternatively, ready-to-feed liquid formula could be used instead.

If there is no electricity, or gas, to allow you to boil water, and you do not have ready-to-feed liquid formula available, bottled water (table, spring, or mineral water) can be used to prepare baby feeds without boiling it first. However, once the feed has been prepared, it should be used immediately.

In the UK, there is no legal definition for what is meant by 'spring', or 'natural' water. Some bottled water labelled as 'natural mineral water' may have high levels of sodium that are not suitable for infants. When buying bottled mineral water, check the label to make sure that it does not contain more than 200mg of sodium (Na) a litre.

Is it safe to give my child bottled water?

Thanks for that Seona, I'm going to stick with the bottled water until the supply improves.

Volvic and Evian among others are safe to use for FF - a longer list on this link

Just for info - I work for a water company in the labs analysing the water. Brown water from a burst main pretty much always means an increased amount of iron in the water from the metal in the pipes. This in itself is not harmful, just doesn't look too great. As far as the law is concerned, a water company would have to cut off supply of tap water and supply alternative water either in bottles or a bowser / tanker to the area if there was any risk to health including that of babies / children. So if you are still getting water from your tap, it should be safe to drink. Bit rubbish of your local water company not to give you enough info though. Putting the water through a britta filter or similar will take out the iron though, boiling won't.