"And despite government guidelines recommending that babies be fed 
exclusively on breast milk for at least the first six months, a recent 
national survey found there was not a single case of a six-month old infant 
that had only consumed breast milk."

Most of the information in this report looks accurate - but not the 
statistics! The Australian Bureau of Statistics have (1) asked questions 
awckwardly (ie no infatn was exuslisvely breastfeeidng at 6 motnhs because 
the questions would not allow parents to state this) and (2) not analysed 
all questions appropriately (didn't adjust denominator for different numbers 
of children at different time periods). My colleague Susan Donath and I have 
published more analysis based on this data - it takes a long time to get the 
data, get it reviewed and published, so the results were just published in 
April. The bottom line is there is little change between 1995 and 2001, few 
infants are exlusively bf to 6 months (but not zero infants).

      Aust N Z J Public Health. 2005 Apr;29(2):171-5.

Breastfeeding and the introduction of solids in Australian infants: data 
from the 2001 National Health Survey.
Donath SM, Amir LH.
Murdoch Childrens Research Institute, Victoria. [log in to unmask]

OBJECTIVE: To present estimates on rates of breastfeeding and timing of 
introduction of solid foods to Australian children, 1998-2001. METHODS: 
Analysis of data from the 2001 Australian National Health Survey (NHS) using 
lifetable methods. Infant feeding questions were asked by personal interview 
in respect to 1,883 children aged under three years of age. RESULTS: At 
discharge from hospital, 83.3% of infants were breastfeeding, which is 
similar to estimates from the 1995 NHS. At 13 weeks postpartum, 64.3% were 
breastfeeding, 49.0% at 25 weeks and 24.9% were continuing to breastfeed at 
one year. At 25 weeks, 18.4% of infants were fully breastfed. Solid food was 
being offered regularly to 15.2% of infants at 13 weeks and 88.0% by 26 
weeks. CONCLUSION: Fewer than 50% of infants are receiving breast milk at 
six months, which is considerably lower than the 80% figure recommended by 
the latest Dietary Guidelines for Children and Adolescents. Very few 
Australian infants are being exclusively breastfed for the recommended six 
months. Infant feeding practices in Australia appear to have remained 
unchanged between 1995 and 2001.

Lisa Amir
MBBS, MMed, IBCLC in Melbourne, Australia

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