Quote:
| That only works AFTER the mother has recovered from the infection, not during the early stages of an active infection. It takes a while (appx 2 weeks) for the antibodies to reach a protective level, and by then the baby could be infected. |
This would be a really nonsensical way for the body to operate. Considering the incubation period of most contagious illnesses is far less than 2 weeks, this would be a completely ineffective way to try to protect the baby against illness. In addition to whatever evidence I'm sure the LLL has disproving this notion, there is personal experience & observation: I've known many families where everyone in the family caught something *except* the infant (in one case, it was the flu they all caught, and the newborn was less than a week old, the only one who didn't get it), and in my own 11 years of nonstop breastfeeding, never once has my infant caught something that I had, even if I caught it from or spread it to others in the family. Not once.
