Hi Everybody:
   How frustrating for Jeanette to have to deal with a bunch of folks
convinced that babies need water. Could you ask "what did mothers do for
thousands of years before bottles were invented?" I know there is a study
somewhere that compared the urine of desert-dwelling breastfeed babies with
the urine of suburban breastfed babies and found no difference; and there are
the studies showing that water bottles increase and maintain jaundice. I did
find this one: "Drinking-water quality, sanitation, and breastfeeding: their
interactive effects on infant health" by VanDerslice, Popkin, and Briscoe in
the Bulletin of the World Health Organization 72(4) 589-601, 1994. Some
conclusions are that giving infants even small portions of contaminated water
supplements nearly doubles their risk of diarrhea, and diminishes the
protective effect of exclusive breastfeeding among babies living in crowded,
highly-contaminated settings." Good luck. Warmly, Nikki (whose husband thinks
that this activity should be called "Nippleodeon", not LACTNET)