"Exclusive breastfeeding" sometimes means nothing EVER other than breast
milk across the baby's lips, so that once water or medicine or tea or butter
or pureed prunes or formula or whatever has crossed the baby's lips, that
baby is no longer "exclusively" breastfed.

Other times, the phrase is used to mean the same thing, but only in the
preceding 24 hours.  In other words, if the baby has had only breast milk
(and NOTHING else) in the previous 24 hours, then you can mark it as
"exclusively breastfed."  So a baby can start out formula feeding and work
toward being exclusively breastfed.  Some people don't like this second
meaning of the phrase, but the World Health Organization uses it for their
reporting surveys.

It does lump together those who have never ever had anything else with those
who, say at age 4 years, are sick, and so have only been breastfeeding for
the previous 24 hours.



Katherine A. Dettwyler, Ph.D.

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