Will my baby get enough vitamin D if I breastfeed?

There’s no question that breast milk is the best nutrition for your baby, but it does not contain enough vitamin D.  For this reason, the American Academy of Pediatrics recommends that all babies get supplemented with 400 IU of vitamin D every day soon after birth.  This can be given as infant vitamin drops, usually 1 ml a day.  Although nursing moms should eat a well balanced diet and continue to take their prenatal vitamins, which includes supplemental vitamin D, such vitamin D will not pass through the breast milk in sufficient amounts. 

Vitamin D is important for your infant’s developing bones.  It is essential for calcium absorption and prevents rickets, a soft bone disease.  Vitamin D also plays an important role in the immune system and may prevent diseases such as diabetes and cancer later in life.

It is not only infants who need extra vitamin D, it is also important for children, teens and adults. While the sun helps our body make vitamin D, it is important to keep infants and children out of the sun during peak sun hours and to apply sunscreen to prevent skin cancer later life.  Therefore, getting vitamin D from the sun can be challenging.  Milk is another good source of Vitamin D as are fish, eggs and cod liver oil.  However, even a healthy diet does not always guarantee that you will get enough Vitamin D.  Your physician may recommend that, in addition to your infant taking vitamin drops, everyone in your family take a daily vitamin supplement containing vitamin D.

Breastfeeding is the ideal nutrition for babies but like all of the fat soluble vitamins, Vitamin D dose not get into breast milk in sufficient quantities.  Therefore, it is recommended to supplement breast feeding infants with Vitamin D in the form of a multivitamin.