OUR BABIES.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 17995, 4 November 1926, Page 12

OUR BABIES.

(By

Hygeia.)

Published under the auspices of Published under the auspices of the Royal New Zealand Society for the Health of Women and children (Plunket Society). " It is wiser to put up a fence at the top of a precipice than to maintain an ambulance at the bottom. " Don't Experiment. li baby c-an't be breast-fed, it is entitled to the nearest possible substitute, namely—Humanised Milk. The mother has no right to experiment on her infant by giving cows' milk, cane sugar and water, patent foods, or condensed milk. Just such foolish experiments have proved disastrous to milliofis of babies already, and. now that we know the truth, there is no longer any excuse for the mother who enters on a course of feeding which cannot do her baby justice, must damage it more or less, and may utterly ruin it. , . Cows’ milk is right and natural for a calf, but utterly wrong and unnatural for a baby. Condensed milk and patent foods are still more unnatural and still more injurious. Half the infantile mortality and most of the debility and sickness of babies are brought on by wrong feeding, back of fresh air and lack of exercise do the rest! Best Method of Bottle Feeding. The feeding-bottle should be simple and easily cleaned, and the nipple should be readily turned inside out. j There should be no long tube. Ihe smaller the hole in the nipple the setter, provided that the baby can be induced to take a sufficiency of food in from 15 to 20 minutes. This can only be done by holding the feeding bottle and maintaining a certain pull on it, so that the teat is kept towards the front of the mouth. By this means, and by moving the teat in the mouth, the baby is brought to suck much more actively, and the whole of the body is stimulated and thrown into action. Observe what takes place if you pull and move about the feeding bottle of a baby who has gone to sleep with the bottle propped up on a pillow. In a moment there tends to be vigorous and widespread action even though the baby should not wake up. If the mother cannot hold the bottle all the time, she should do so for the first five or ten mintes of each feeding. By this means a good start is ensured, and the whole body is brought into action. The period of main vigour of sucking and associated general exercise is the last five miutes of so of each feeding. Therefore we should secure this at least at its best. Cleanliness. All bottles or vessels for milk must be kept scrupulously clean. This can be effected by washing immediately after use with cold water, and then with hot water and soda, scouring with a brush kept specially for the purpose. Hot water should never be used first, because it coagulates the albumen of J milk and prevents proper cleansing. Milk bottles should be turned upside down to drain, and may he left thus or covered to prevent the accumulation of dust or particles floating in the air. Rinse again with boiled water immediately before use, and on no account | follow this rinsing by wiping out with j any form of cloth or towel, since, how- | ever clean this might be, it would preb-

ably contaminate the vessel -with microbes. Feeding-bottles should be thoroughtly cleansed immediately after use, and should then be baked or boiled. See “Feeding Bottles.” Milk. No effort should be spared to get this as soon after milking as possible. Any milk that has been standing for 12 hours without having been rapidly cooled down, covered to keep out falling particles, and kept below 60 deg. Fahrenheit, is unfit for feeding infants. Where such is the only milk obtainable, it should be heated at once to 155 deg. Fahrenheit and kept at that temperature for five or ten minutes to prevent -further growth of fermentative organisms. It should then be covered, cooled rapidly by placing the jug or jar in cold water for half-an-hour, and kept in a cool, clean outdoor safe. Heating carried above 155 deg. Fahrenheit seriously impairs the nutritive qualities o£ the milk. The milk of a herd of cows is more reliable as regards equality, of composition than the milk of a single cow. In winter the evening milk of a given herd is distinctly richer than the morning milk; and in autumn milk is decidedly richer than in the spring. The morning milk is easily cooled, because early in the day water is generally available which has not been subjected to sunshine or warm air. A shallow pan of water can be cooled by placing it in the open air at sunset, with a clear sky above it, and out of reach of the early morning sun. On very warm days no mere safe is cool enough to prevent the risk of an injurious fermentative growth taking place in the course of the day. At such times the mother would naturally avail herself of ice ,or cool well-water if at hand, or she might lower her stock of milk into the well.