I think many will be asking whether the breastfed infants were absolutely
exclusively breastfed from birth. Here is a snip from the methods of this
article that answer this:

"Initiation and duration of breastfeeding were documented independently by
interviewers who assessed the cohort at age 3 years. These interviewers were
unaware of the atopy and asthma outcomes, since these were recorded in later
life.15 Duration of breastfeeding and age at introduction of cow's milk and
other foods to the infant's diet were verified at age 3 years from records
maintained through the New Zealand Plunket Nurse programme, in which
newborns and infants were assessed through regular home and clinic visits,
weekly at first then less frequently, until children were aged 2-3 years.
Although many newborns who were breastfed received a
nightly formula feed while in hospital to allow the mother to sleep, most
had hospital stays of only 3-4 days. Thus,
the extent of other feeding, if only in that period, was minor. Those
infants not breastfed generally received
formula feeding prepared from dried cow's milk powder."

Thus "many" of the "exclusively breastfed" infants weren't actually
exclusively breastfed.


Sara Bernard
The Netherlands

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