OUR BABIES.

Otago Witness, Issue 3488, 18 January 1921, Page 51

OUR BABIES.

By

Hygeia.

Published und?r the auspices of the Royal New Zealand Society for the Health »f Women and Children. "It Is wiser to put up a fenca at the top of a precipice than to maintain an ambulance at the bottom.”

HOT WEATHER AND BABIES. East week I showed that hot weather was liable to be a very serious matter for infants, quite apart from its causing milk and other liquid food to become unsafe, owing to the rapid growth of microbes. Even where a baby is breast-fed, it is liable to become upset and contract diarrhoea. This is mainly attributable to not having an ample supply of pure, fresh air day and night, and to lack of common sense in regard to bedding and clothing. AN ILLUSTRATIVE CASE. I have before me some very interesting notes of a case which shows clearly the effect of two hot nor’-wester days on an ailing baby who was just beginning to do well. The parents kept a diary. On October 8 and 9 (the two hottest days we have had this season) there are notes to the following effect:— October B.—Baby sleepless owing to hot weather and sweating. Took 21oz from breast and 7oz of Humanised Milk; — total, 28oz. October 9.—Nor’-wester continues; very sultry. Baby limp, listless, and fretful all day. Sweating very much. Took only 17oz from the breast and 6oz by bottle; — total, 230 z. The average quantity of food taken by the same baby for the succeeding week waa 340 z a day, and for the next week 360 Z daily. The baby was weighed before and after each nursing to make sure exactly how much he was getting from the breast. SrEciAi. Note of Warning. It must not be supposed that there is any harm in a baby taking somewhat less food on a very hot day—quite the reverse. Less food is needed whe** heat is excessive—indeed, in the case of a baby at the breast. Nature provides for this in a very wonderful way. Professor Von Pirquet, the leading authority in Vienna, has shown that not only the quantity, but also the quality, of the milk drawn off by the suckled infant from the mother’s breast is influenced by the child’s appetite. On a very hot day the appetite falls off more or less, and the baby soon ceases to suck, or sucks languidly; hence it received only the weaker fore-milk, while the rich aftermilk, or “strippings,” remains behind in the breasts. The mother should take this hint from Nature if her baby is being bottle-fed. Thus she may cut down the day’s allowance. say, by a fourth or a fifth on any exceptionally hot day, making up the quantity by adding boiled water to the fojsd. If the baby appears to be troubled with thirst between meals at such times, it should be given a little plain boiled water by spoon or bottle. This applies equally to nurslings and “bottle-feds.” Bottle-fed babies are specially liable to be overfed in hot weather, and the mother cannot he too strongly impressed with the fact that a child’s average food requirement in summer is rather less than in winter, but that more rather than less water is needed. An ounce or two one way or the other in the day’s supply often makes all the difference in the baby’s digestion, growth, and comfort. More BABIES ABE SERIOUSLY UPSET BY OVERFEEDING THAN BY UNDERFEEDING, ESPECIALLY IN SUMMER TIME. On pointing out to the mother that the baby would not have been upset and would not have gone off his food, to the extreme degree shown in the above case, if the clothing had been adapted to the sudden change in the weather, she expressed the greatest surprise, saving she had been told that it was most dangerous to lessen the coverings on account of mere changes in the daily temperature. She said she quite understood that the summer clothing should be lighter than the winter clothing, but she had been warned against “chopping and changing” at other times. Of course, it is quite true that it would be a mistake to alter the bedding and cloth ■ ing capiiciously to meet every slight change in the weather; but the mother cannot be too much on her guard to exercise common sense in the direction of preventing her baby from being caused to stew and sweat on hot days, or to be pinched with cold through a sudden change in the other direction.