Perhaps my greatest professional fantasy is to put the issue of goat’s milk in babies to rest. We’ve entered the 21st century. Our understanding of infant digestive health has advanced to the point where goat’s milk needs to gracefully take its place in history.
So what’s the problem? Although this may be grandma’s solution to “colic”, there are some good reasons why the child under a year shouldn’t drink goat’s milk. Unprocessed goat’s milk is deficient in vitamins B & C, folate and iron. It contains levels of sodium, potassium, and protein which are too high for a baby’s kidneys. Such concentrated levels of minerals can be life-threatening should a baby continue to drink it when sick or dehydrated. Despite its popularity with past generations, you shouldn’t be using goat’s milk or cow’s milk with your baby under 12 months unless you happen to be a goat or a cow.
Our long love affair with goat’s milk is based upon the softness of the curds produced when exposed to acid. Predating the availability of data showing that goats weren’t much different from cows as far as allergy is concerned, our primitive understanding of nutrition was dependent upon what babies brought up in the burp cloth. And to the goat’s credit, their milk does form a softer curd but it has no relevance to what we currently understand about infant irritability.
Stick with breast feeding. If that doesn’t work, use a nutritionally complete formula and save goat and cow’s milk for after 12 months.