>Could you please elaborate on your statement that milk is not sterile while
>it is in the breast? At the risk of sounding unenlightened--this is a new
>concept to me.
>Marie Davis,RN,IBCLC

I haven't seen anyone respond to this, so I'll offer an explanation.  I
doubt this is a new concept for you, it's just a difference in how you are
thinking of the term sterile.  I'm sure you know the living white blood
cells are in the milk, but since they are beneficial, you do not
considering them to be making the milk non-sterile.  Technically, sterile
means that there are no living things contained in the milk, no cells, no
bacteria, nothing.

I also wanted to mention that I was pleasantly surprised to see a lovely
picture of a mother breastfeeding her child on the bedroom wall of the
Casey Jones museum in Jackson, TN.  This is the house that belonged to
Casey Jones, the train engineer killed in a train wreck in the early part
of this century.  I know there is someone from Jackson on Lactnet, and I
didn't know if they had ever noticed it.

Donna

Donna J. Spannaus-Martin, Ph.D., MT (ASCP)
Assistant Professor, Clinical Laboratory Sciences,
University of Tennessee, Memphis
http://www.utmem.edu/allied/CLS.html