Long bottle-feeding may cause obesity

Children who regularly use a bottle at age 2 are more likely to become obese by the time of kindergarten that those who switch to cups at younger ages.

After following 6,750 US children from the time of birth, scientists found that at age 5, about 23 percent of the children who drank from a bottle at age 2 were obese, compared to about 16 percent of kids who had were weaned off a bottle by age 2.

Therefore, kids who were drinking from a bottle at the age of 2 were 33 percent more likely to be obese by age 5.5 than those who fused to using cup earlier.

However, the study also showed researchers from Temple University that nearly one in four toddlers were still a regular bottle user at age 2 the scientists wrote in The Journal of Pediatrics.

"At older ages, the bottle is probably used for comfort and convenience rather than nourishment," said lead researcher Rachel Gooze who suggested that using bottles at age 2 may feed children with more calories than they need.

"A 24-month-old girl of average weight and height who is put to bed with an eight-ounce bottle of whole milk would receive approximately 12 percent of her daily caloric needs from that bottle," she said.

"This is a practice (prolonged bottle-feeding) that has been discouraged for years because it promotes tooth decay, and this is one of the first studies to show that it may also promote obesity," says pediatrician Robert Whitaker, study co-author.

"This study alone doesn’t prove that prolonged bottle use causes obesity, but it won’t do any harm to stop the bottle by age 1. A child can get adequate nutrition without it," he added.

Source: presstv.ir