Hi Sarah,
Good question. I think that it is very reasonable to consider an infant under 6 months as different to an infant older than 6 months, the critical factor being the impact of the termination of exclusive breastfeeding. Certainly infant formula can be just another complementary food for the infant older than 6 months. However, as a replacement for breastmilk that's a bit of a different matter. We can't go to epidemiological studies to show that donor milk is better than formula for this age group because such studies do not exist. We do however, know that infants weaned from their mother's milk at under a year of age (well, actually under 3 years of age) have greater rates of infection than those who continue breastfeeding, some evidence of a negative impact of early weaning on cognitive development and there is certainly plenty of evidence that physiologically babies 6-12 months are "expected" to be breastfeeding. For myself in considering this issue I look at what differences there might be between donor milk and mothers own milk (which will depend on what treatment the milk has been subjected to, has it been frozen? has it been heated?). Depending on the treatment some of the immunological factors in donor milk will be depleted. What about the nutritional factors??? I have not looked at this in depth but what understanding I have is that the nutritional component of breast milk is not greatly affected by freezing or heating. Then it is necessary to look at the difference between breastmilk and infant formula. Apart form the immunological components the difference in the composition between breastmilk (regardless of whether it has been frozen or heated) is vast. I have tried to think of how it might be possible for donor milk to be nutritionally insignificantly different from infant formula but given how vast the difference is between the two I can't picture it. Perhaps this is something that you've got a better handle on than me?  Am I getting close to the crux of the issue for you?
Karleen Gribble
Australia
PS. and I know that there's been a lot of traffic in this thread so it may have been missed but if you're willing to describe why for you formula would be preferable to donor milk I'm still interested to hear.


>  In the case of a breastfed baby older than six months who requires supplementation, what reason would there be to believe that donor milk would be better than formula for that supplementation? (Let's assume that this is a situation where the parents are not planning to stick to a cow's milk exclusion diet as solids are introduced, so the baby is going to be getting exposure to cow's milk protein anyway in other forms.) I honestly cannot see what evidence there would be for advantages of donor milk over formula in such a case. I'm happy for you to point out anything you feel I'm missing here by way of evidence.

             ***********************************************

Archives: http://community.lsoft.com/archives/LACTNET.html
To reach list owners: [log in to unmask]
Mail all list management commands to: [log in to unmask]
COMMANDS:
1. To temporarily stop your subscription write in the body of an email: set lactnet nomail
2. To start it again: set lactnet mail
3. To unsubscribe: unsubscribe lactnet
4. To get a comprehensive list of rules and directions: get lactnet welcome