Healthy Beginnings: Water Quality for Infants & Children

Water pollution impacts all of us, but children and infants are especially at risk of exposure to contaminated water. Children drink more water per pound of body weight than adults, which means they also ingest higher amounts of any harmful chemicals that may be present in the water.

In addition, when young children swim, they typically swallow more water than adults, and are therefore at greater risk of exposure to contaminants in lakes, rivers, and bays.

Children are also more vulnerable to harm from contaminated water since their metabolic systems and organ systems are still developing. Toxic chemicals are especially harmful to children’s developing organs and tissues because it is harder for their systems to break down and get rid of harmful chemicals that enter their bodies.

For instance, long-term exposure to lead, a potent neurotoxicant, can result in permanent neurological damage in young children. Contaminants from industrial farms such as nitrate from fertilizers or atrazine, an herbicide known to disrupt hormone function, can also be very harmful to children when consumed in water. (content courtesy of Clean Water for All)

The best line of defense to protect our children and the nation’s water quality is to prevent harmful contaminants from entering groundwater, rivers, lakes, streams and bays in the first place.

Once groundwater or surface water is contaminated, it can be very difficult and expensive to treat that water so that it is safe to drink. When there is a failure to prevent or treat contamination, or treatment is delayed, communities are left to deal with the consequences.

Child development:

According to ewg.org: "Some drinking water contaminants are more harmful when exposure occurs during critical windows in a child’s development. These exposures can have serious effects on health that continue for a lifetime, or their impact on health may surface decades later"

TAP water & bottle fed babies:

Water contamination is especially concerning for bottle-fed infants. A baby fed exclusively powdered formula mixed with tap water drinks the most water for its small size of any age group.

Tap water can be 85 percent of a formula-fed baby’s diet, and this period of intense exposure can last four to six months, until parents start supplementing formula with food.

Is it safe for newborns to drink tap water?

According to nct.org.uk: "Babies under six months should only drink tap water that has been boiled and cooled down. Water straight from the tap is not sterile so is not suitable for younger babies. Bottled water is not recommended for babies or toddlers as it may contain too much salt or sulphate"

(Content Courtesy of Clean Water For All, EWG.org and nct.org.uk)