The relationship between breastfeeding and reported respiratory and gastrointestinal infection rates in young children

Table 5 Breastfeeding at 3 months of age on Infection of Middle Ear between 3 and 6 months of age

Factor	N	% Reporting infection of middle ear by whether or not child still breastfeeding at 3 months of age		Breastfeeding on odds of infection of middle between 3 and 6 months of age
Factor	N	No	Yes	a-OR	95%CI	Interaction p-value
Gender
Female	N = 3276	14.1%	9.0%	0.55	0.41–0.74
Male	N = 3418	12.2%	11.4%	1.02	0.77–1.35	0.02
Continent
US	N = 2665	17.4%	13.6%	0.76	0.58–0.99
Europe	N = 4029	9.1%	8.4%	0.77	0.57–1.05	0.68
Season age 3mo
Dec – Feb	N = 1595	14.2%	7.8%	0.45	0.29–0.70
Mar – May	N = 1275	15.6%	12.1%	0.77	0.53–1.12
Jun – Aug	N = 1672	12.8%	13.1%	1.00	0.67–1.48
Sept - Nov	N = 1730	10.4%	8.1%	0.85	Few infections	0.02

a-ORs = odds ratio are adjusted (a) for age of mother at birth, maternal education, single child, number of rooms in household, parental working and smoking status when child was 9 months of age, if the child was a first degree relative of a type 1 diabetic individual, whether daycare or social group had started at the last visit and other variable not being examined for interaction (gender, continent or season at 3 months of age). Bold face type indicates statistical significance with a p-value < 0.05

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