MISCELLANEOUS REVIEW

Abstract

Some Practical Considerations of Economy and Efficiency in Infant Feeding. American Journal of Public Health, 52:125-142, 1962. (Reprinted for the U. S. Department of Health, Education, and Welfare; Children's Bureau.) A Joint Committee of the Food and Nutrition Section and the Maternal and Child Health Section of the American Public Health Association has written this useful review. Compressed into its 17 pages is a great deal of pertinent information from man widely scattered sources and of special interest to physicians and nurses engaged in infant feeding practices among families where economy is important. Infant feeding practices have been reviewed with special regard to cost, convenience, and safety. But there are many facts of interest to the private practitioner whose patients may be free of financial worry. Impressive is the statement that in 1957 some 13,500,000 United States children were in families whose total income was less than $3,000 a year. In 1956, one of five dwelling units in small cities or rural areas had no running water inside the structure. The cost of breast feeding in relation to bottle feeding depends upon the cost of the additional nutrients eaten by the mother. With a truly low-cost diet (which impressed this reviewer as so unpalatable as to be unrealistic the cost was calculated at 15ø a day, whereas with a moderate cost diet it was 40ø a day. An evaporated milk formula was estimated at 15ø a day and pasteurized whole milk at 25ø a day. The safety of breast milk was accepted as vastly superior to formulas.