These questions are huge and crucial for new parents to consider. In fact, it’s important to consider everything down to the detail - including the water purity in your home. Whether you opt for a water softener or a water filter, there are plenty of different options for you to make sure that your baby has the water purity that they need to succeed.
Babies are Particularly Vulnerable to the Effects of Poor Water
While no one wants to think about anything that could harm the newest member of their family, that’s precisely why water purity is so important. As the World Health Organization states, children during their first year of life are more susceptible to the negative results of contaminants in their drinking water.
That’s why it’s so important to be vigilant and proactive about making sure your drinking water is safe when you can. This will help to avoid introducing a baby to bacteria, viruses, and infections that could be linked to contaminated drinking water.
Why Is Drinking Water Important for Babies?
Needless to say, you probably aren’t going to find your newborn drinking a glass of water. When a baby is nursing, it’s even a good idea to avoid giving them water to drink. After all, a baby’s health has to be perfectly balanced and they can’t take any action on their own to handle it.
The issue of pure drinking water early in life primarily comes up when it comes to alternatives to breastfeeding. Not every mother and child can breastfeed, for a variety of reasons. The most common alternative is to use infant milk formula, which requires water to mix into it.
Even indirectly, parents who are breastfeeding should make sure they’re drinking pure water as well. This is the same concept as the mother’s health directly relating to the baby’s since they are providing nutrients for their new little one. As such, they need to make sure they’re taking proper care of themselves - including drinking clean and safe water.
There comes a point as your baby grows and even grows into childhood, their need for clean and pure water becomes more direct. Making sure that they have access to clean drinking water in the future is the best way to set them up for a healthy life at the baseline of their needs.
Why Babies Need Clean Water for Hygiene
The direct intake of water is important when referring to babies but it’s also crucial to remember that isn’t the only use for pure and safe water. Taking care of your baby’s hygiene is also crucial to ensuring they stay happy and healthy. In fact, it’s so important that it’s at the center of the World Health Organization’s and United Nations’ considerations under WASH - water, sanitation, and hygiene.
Of course, when you’re getting your newborn ready for a bath, you can’t do that with contaminated water. In turn, this becomes another situation in which the consideration of access to clean water is important. Bathing a child or brushing their teeth when they come in with impure water can introduce bacteria and other harmful things to your child.
As children get older, it’s also worth considering how they’ll have access to other basic requisites like frequent hand washing. Without access to clean water for common practices like these, the chance of the spread of disease and other harmful introductions increases which means that pure water can serve as a preventative measure to keep children safe from harm.
Babies and the Need for Clean Water in the Kitchen
As we’ve noted already, there’s more to clean water than directly drinking it as a lone glass. This means that while your child may eat formula or still breastfeed early on in their life, they’ll eventually make the switch over to the same food eaten by older children and adults - sometimes with some modifications.
In food preparation, there are plenty of instances in which you need access to safe and pure water to make food. Otherwise, you risk carrying over the contaminants from impure water over into your food preparation. This can cause problems similar to those of drinking impure water.
No matter what angle it’s looked at from, there’s an underlying moral that water is essential for not only adults but everyone down to newborn babies. From the moment they’re born and, for mothers, even before that, a reliable source of clean water is essential. It’s worth looking into your own water supply and seeing if you need to address any concerns to secure pure water when possible.
**Guest post
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