Exclusive BF for 6 months may be harmful

[Longtalljosie]

Oh bloody hell

The problem is it's only one study but will be seized on even if later it's put into context.

The other problem is the way it implies that breastfeeding is in some way a problem.

The third problem is the possibility they might turn out to be right, because I loved BLW and want to do it again...

I can hear certain members of my wider family from here...

Minshu - the iron in breastmilk is very good at getting through and is good for at least 6 months. The iron in formula isn't - about 4% IIRC - which is why they have to add so much.

When I was weaning DD (age 2), I paid no attention to 'guidelines' and followed her. At 3.5 months she stopped sleeping through, seemed restless, and was genuinely interested and trying to grab what we were eating. At 4 months, to the day, using Gina Ford's weaning book (ignoring her schedules), I started weaning her. She was like a changed baby! I would not say every baby needs weaning at age _, I would say "follow YOUR instincts and YOUR baby's signals" and you will be fine. Having said that, I avoided protein until age 6 months.

All I've been able to imagine today is Cow and Gate rubbing their hands with glee and planning more adverts along the lines of the ridiculous big cup of milk one. (Why IS that still on the telly? Thought it got pulled for being misleading?)

shudders

The article isn't in the British Medical Journal today (well yesterday.) I know it's not the point but , surely that's a fairly imprtant part for them to get right.

The argument is not with iron in breast milk, but the depleted stores of iron in babies by 6 months, so that would go hand in hand with formula milk no longer being a suitable exclusive feed by that age. It's just that you're not told to exclusively formula feed until 6 months, unlike with breastfeeding. I breast fed all 3 of mine and weaned them all before six months and my middle son at 3 months because i felt that was right for him, i also gave all of mine peanut butter at around 5 months as i believed a study carried out in Israel to make more sense then studies done in Europe. I was slated by the health visitor but supported by my loving family, and my friends new to be respectful of my choices. I think we should all be mindful that respect and support goes much further than always trying to tell people what to do and try to see the reasons for these changes in medical opinion. But importantly i think the health visitors and midwives should be more involved in families so that way they could support you better rather than giving you a barrage of BS for the choices you make with the love in your heart for your kids, you know your baby and the way your family works, this study is nothing new we have all known that iron levels in babies become depleted by around 6 months,this is just a study done opposing the WHO study. Nothing to get worked up about, do some research talk to your health professionals and than look at that baby you love and say i done good. As that is all you can do.

I found it very hard to research in the post partum slightly PND stage. I personally need to have one course of action, not all these mixed ideas. I feel sorry for my SIL with her 10 week old....

After quite a bit of hassle registering, I left a comment, critical of their headline, on the Sun webpage. There is no sign of it yet.
I wonder why ? ...

I suspect this BMJ article is mainly about giving babyfood manufacturers a scientific peg on which to hang their labelling of babyfoods as suitable from 4 and not 6 months. They're fighting a bit of a rearguard action with the Advertising Standards Agency, in view of the WHO guidelines about BF until 6 months. Yes it's written by scientists and is a review of previous studies - if it wasn't, it wouldn't be much use to wave at the ASA. But it's a small, selective review of previous work (unlike the much bigger and more comprehensive WHO one) - they were probably asked to have a bit of a trawl to see what they could find which would help justify the manufacturers labelling .

Trouble is, the reporting ends up scaring all the rest of us - I felt really fed up yesterday morning.

I am very sceptical about this latest reearch.
My dd was weaned just before 6 months and has no allergies, eats everything and isn't too picky.

Look, I don't think it does any of us any favours to overplay the funding issue.

This paper was not funded by the baby food industry as far as I can make out.

The authors make a declaration (which I would imagine is a standard one) saying that they have taken money from industry within the last three years. I imagine almost all scientists take that sort of funding from time to time - labs aren't swimming in cash.

There's a wider point about the insidious nature of funding sources and decisions taken seemingly spontaneously on the ground, I accept, but that wouldn't affect this paper more than any other.

What we need is someone who can look at the evidence the WHO used, and the evidence this study used, and weigh up who's done it better.

And look at it in the context of what we've previously been told about babies having enough iron stores for six months plus in almost all cases, and also look at the evidence early weaning causes allergies versus the evidence 6 month weaning causes allergies.

We do need Ben Goldacre! MNHQ - could you email him and ask him if he would? This is what he does, after all...

Article seems to be saying that authors have done some consulting work for baby food manufacturers because they are experts in baby nutrition. Not that their research was funded by baby food manufacturers.

So it is OK for mothers in "third world" countries to exclusively BF for 6 months because their is a lack of suitable weaning food. But it's now not advised in "first world" countries because our water is cleaner and we have lots of suitable weaning foods?

Sorry, but what a load of old rubbish. For thousands of years babies have been BF and as a race we are all still here. I just don't see how any sensible person can say that breastmilk can not be good for your baby.

Are we going back to the good old days when I was a baby and bottle feeding was encouraged as the best thing for your baby?

Is there any actual evidence provided that a certain percentage of babies have allergies/won't eat etc?

I'm not looking forward to visiting the inlaws next weekend as my MIL is dead against me still breastfeeding at 5 months!! I plan to continue until my DD decides she doesn't want it anymore.

I will be going for BLW. At the moment she is after food but not that interested when I give her "solids". However, she does have a couple of teaspooons a day of homemade purees.

I absolutely will not help the babyfood business, who I suspect are at the root of this "research".

Sadly I'm not entire sure Ben Goldacre would be completely unbiased on this one. He had a lot of derogatory things to say about mothers re. MMR - surprisingly sexist. (Oddly enough he didn't criticize fathers.)

Think our best bet for analysis would be Cochrane or Drug & Therapeutics Bulletin. I might email the editor of DTB and see if he has any views - I used to work with him.

Edam - my experience around the time of the original MMR fuss was that it was actually mothers rather than parents who were flapping. I honestly can't remember any dads mentioning it. So if there is sexism in Ben Goldacre's consideration of that issue - it's probably because there is sexism in our realationships and many of us consider vaccines a woman's issue. Weaning is probably the same tbh.

I totally agree, Northernlurker!

I weaned my daughter at 4.5 months because her sleep started being even more erratic than before and she was really interested in food, trying to grab food from our plates. She's now 2.5 years old and eats a wide range of foods, has had only 1 bout of sickness and is a good weight for her height. I think only you can know your child and while it's useful to read studies and take the advice, the offical advice will always err on the side of caution. If you think you know your child is ready at 4+ months, go for it.

That said as we weaned we took it slowly so we had 2 weeks of baby rice and introduced carrot at week 3 etc. By 5.5 months she'd was eating strawberries etc by herself and we introduced meat at 6 months. I found this less hectic for a busy mum too and I was fully in the swing of pureeing and freezing by the time DD was 6 months.

northernlurker...surprisingly sexist post right there from you (when mothers worry about their children's health it's called 'flapping' is it?).

Ben Goldacre called mothers stupid. That is sexist. Not every single mother disagreed with him on MMR and even if they did, they are quite entitled to their views. He's entitled to his take on the science, but he's not entitled to make derogatory remarks about gender because some people of that gender don't treat his every word as gospel.

FWIW when ds was a baby I asked my colleagues at DTB about MMR. They said it's safe as far as all the studies go, but with the caveat that the safety studies are not sufficient. Cochrane also had similar caveats at the time. So Goldcare was not only sexist but wrong - scientists should not be dogmatic, that's kind of the whole point of the scientific approach.

Oh, and to say it was only mothers concerned about MMR is not justifiable in someone who reviews the literature unless they have a study saying that.

edam: try telling most scientists that (re non dogmatic and open minded approach)

what exactly did they measure?

Iron in breast milk?

Iron in babies' blood?

We all know that that the actual levels of iron in breast milk seem low when compared to formula, but that iron in breast milk is far more readily absorbed.

If they prove that EBF babies are anaemic at 6-7 months, and EFF are not........... then yes, their recommendations may have validity.

If their recommendations are based purely on measurements of iron in breast milk, without concomitant measurements in babies' blood, their conclusions/recommendations are highly flawed.

yy, I know Sophable, but that's the theory - and it's the duty of anyone who claims to inform the public about science to remember it.