This old advice to discard the first 5ml of breastmilk before expressing
probably comes from efforts in the 1970s and 1980s to reduce bacterial
contamination in expressed breastmilk for preterm infants. Numerous
protocols were in vogue back then to decrease pathological bacteria
numbers. Some of the newest research shows that human milk contains over
700 species of bacteria and other old research long ago demonstrated that
discarding the first few drops of breastmilk does not decrease
contamination. Sounds like someone has not kept up with current research
and should not be giving advice that is outdated.

Marsha Walker, RN, IBCLC
Weston, MA

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