Diet and Nutrition Survey of Infants and Young Children

This one off survey takes a detailed look at what infants aged between 4 and eighteen months eat and what their nutritional health is as a result.

The study was commissioned by the Department of Health and Food Standards Agency (FSA) and was carried out by a consortium that included ourselves, MRC Human Nutrition Research (HNR), the Human Nutrition Research Centre at Newcastle University and the MRC Epidemiology Unit in Cambridge.

We found:

• 22% of infants were never breastfed.
• 57% of infants who were breastfed, weren't breastfed beyond three months;
• 66% of infants across the UK brushed their teeth at least once day, in comparison with 84% of infants in Scotland;
• 75% of young children were weaned before five months, despite the recommendation that weaning occurs around six months.

Read the full report here.

Potential policy impact

Data from the survey will be used in three ways: it'll be used to measure whether Government recommendations about infant food and nutritional intake are being used; to measure whether parents are taking notice of the Government's advice on breastfeeding and weaning and finally; to underpin the Department of Health's work on promoting healthy diets and protecting consumer's rights.

Method

Our interviewers spoke to around 2300 parents of children aged between 4 and eighteen months, from across England, Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland.

In collaboration with