Just A Few Thoughts

There are many web sites full of statistics as to whether cloth is better for your baby and the environment, so I will leave the science to them. Here are just some of the arguments I constantly hear against using cloth, and a few simple thoughts to help you make your own minds up.

If you look at the wider picture, for every twenty disposables thrown away, twenty more have to be made.

Huge amounts of water are used in the making of pulp that goes into the nappies, together with the water that goes into making the plastic for the packaging of them, and the numerous extra bags to place the nappies in land fill.

A whole cup of crude oil is used to make the plastic for one disposable nappy.

Add to this the fuel used, and pollution caused by all the factories in the making of the pulp, the paper, the plastic and the gel contained in most nappies, the transport used to convey all the nappies to all the suppliers across the world every day, and you are looking at a huge cost to the environment.

Land fill is also an environmental problem. Not only because these nappies take ages to break down but also because we do not know what the gel inside the nappy does to the land it fills!

Of course using cloth has its own effect on the environment too, the fuel and water used in the making of the fabric and elastic, the transport of that fabric, the electric used to make the nappies. Then there is the water to wash them, plus the powder that some may use , and the dryer to dry them if they aren’t line dried.

Twenty cloth nappies, however, can have six years of use as a nappy before they have to be cut up and used as cloths (I know because three of my children used the same nappies). They are only delivered once, and usually without the plastic outer packaging. They do not go to land fill, and if put in a compost bin would decompose.

I’ll leave you to work out which you feel is best for the environment.

This is a complete myth. Most babies at some point during their use of nappies get nappy rash but because air can circulate through cloth, it is far less likely to occur with a cloth bound baby.

With modern fitted nappies and wraps, this is very unlikely to happen. If it does happen it is usually the fitting of the nappy or wrap rather than the items themselves that are at fault.

"Using cloth is hard work. Anything that makes life easier for a parent is better for everyone"

Using disposables is very easy. Buy them, put them on a baby, put them in the bin. Most people don’t even bother putting the waste down the toilet beforehand. There is no one who would dispute that you can’t get easier than that!

It is another myth however, that cloth is very hard work . Use them, throw away the waste, put them in a lidded bucket, an extra wash every two or three days, dry them. It’s not as labour intensive as people imagine.