As a former family day care provider in Wisconsin, this sounds quite similar
to the rules here, too.  I hope I'm remembering everything correctly but it
seems that about two years ago, Wisconsin put this same plan into place for
certified family day care homes.

The rule was that if the baby is fed  artificial infant milk (the feeding
choice having been made by the parents), then day care providers were
required to provide it as part of the food program and yes, we could choose
the brand.  If the parents wanted a different brand than what the day care
provider wanted to buy then parents could provide the AIM.  If the baby was
breastfed then a statement was signed by the parents that gave that
information.  Similarly, if the parents wanted to provide their own AIM, the
statement declined the AIM offered by the provider.

As a daycare provider I cared mostly for breastfed babies and when this
policy went into place the little boy I cared for was 4 so I never had direct
experience with this.  There was no requirement at any time to feed breastfed
babies AIM.  The policy focused on those babies already fed AIM and who
provided it.  I believe this was because providers were being reimbursed for
feedings that they didn't supply the product for themselves and the state was
trying to be certain of who was supplying what.  Breastfed babies were not
reimbursed for breastmilk feedings, of course.

It was more difficult to handle breastfed babies once they became four months
old, however.  At that point the state would reimburse you if you offered
cereal and for enlightened parents who opted to focus only on breastmilk - a
signed MDs statement was eventually required when the baby turned six months
old and was still only fed breastmilk.  I even attended a training for
providers who cared for breastfed babies - mostly out of curiousity  - and
the information offered was outdated and inaccurate (those are my nice words
- I have others for the training session!).  Many questions were written so
that the answers given showed how inadequate breastmilk is and how breastfed
babies need extra everything - time, work, food, vitamins etc.  I did write a
lengthly evaluation and suggested they update their training and information
and how to do that but I never saw any action.

Hope that helps!
Mary Romskog

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