INFANTILE DISEASE AND PROPER FEEDING.
By Lauretta Kress
[Lauretta Kress, M. D., in Australasian Good Health.] IMPROPER feeding is the most active cause of infantile disease. A great deal of suffering and many premature deaths result from digestive derangements. How many puny children with shrunken, wasted frames would quickly become happy, healthy, and well-nourished, if fed according to their requirements! There is rarely any lack of food, for mothers are only too willing to provide for their little ones; it is for want of food which they can digest and assimilate that so many suffer. The pernicious habit of cramming something into the child's mouth every time it is opened is responsible for endless mischief. Regularity is a necessity in infant feeding, and the frequency of the meals must be determined by the physical condition of the child. Few children cry from hunger; pain resulting from overfeeding is a much more likely cause, and a little warm water internally, or a warm application externally, will usually give speedy relief. Whatever is done, more food must not be crowded into the stomach merely to hush the child's voice. Many a voice has been forever hushed in this way. Do not endanger the life of your child by feeding it on various condensed milks. Milk obtained from dairymen or milkmen should not be relied upon, as it is often a carrier of various diseases, and is always adulterated with preservatives which are injurious and especially dangerous to the structures of the feeble infants. As high as eleven grains of boracic acid have been discovered in a pint of milk. It has been acknowledged that the milk trade would have to be abandoned if the preservatives were not used, as the milk would spoil before it could be delivered at the homes in our large cities. The best food for babies is, undoubtedly, mother's milk. Whenever possible, infants should be nursed for eight or ten months, but not longer. Children who have inherited good constitutions do not require more than five meals—four in the daytime and one at night—in each twenty-four hours, except during the first two months of infant life. Between the fourth and eighth months the interval should be prolonged to five hours, and at the end of the first year only three meals a day need be provided, the child being allowed to sleep soundly all night. To break a child of night nursing, a little warm water may be administered in the bottle in place of the customary milk; the baby will drink freely and then drop off to sleep again. Feeble or premature children must be fed rather more frequently than those of sounder constitutions, and they require extra care. Never allow an infant to sleep at the breast or with a feeding bottle in its mouth; let it stop eating as soon as its hunger is appeased. This constant suction is responsible for the frequency of posterior nasal growths and enlarged, inflamed tonsils. Nor is it advisable to give sugar teats or sweets to soothe the crying child. Some mothers administer sugar and water the first few days of life, but this practise causes spasms and similar disturbances. Herb teas are unnecessary and often harmful. Plain water is by far the best drink for young children. When the mother is unable to suckle her child, so that artificial feeding becomes a necessity, cow's milk, properly sterilized and diluted, is the best substitute. Nipples and tubes of feeding-bottles must be kept clean and free from germs. At the third or fourth month, sanitarium infant food, zwieback (twice baked bread) finely grated or powdered, or pulverized granose flakes may be added to the milk. These products are much more easily digested than the majority of so-called "infant foods," and are certain to be pure and unadulterated.