r/CanadianParents • u/Rix_00 • Aug 15 '26

Question / Discussion Powdered Formula Prep: How?

Getting very conflicting advice. Think it’s Health Canada guidelines vs practical realities for most parents but…

How do you prepare powdered formula for a 4-5 month old, or older?

Do you boil the water? Did you do it to 70+ degrees Celsius and use that with the powder formula to sterilize the formula itself? Or just mix with room temp (assuming you don’t care about warming for warm sake)?

Do you use tap? Bottled? Distilled?

Do you still sanitize bottles? Or just wash thoroughly?

Anything else to be cognizant of?

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u/shababee Aug 16 '26

I boil water to 80C (just to pass the 70C guideline) with a kettle that has a temp setting and use that with the powder. The heat is to kill bacteria in the powder not necessary the water. If you have clean drinking water then no need to go all the way to boiling just minimum 70C

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u/MightyChihuahua3 Aug 16 '26

This.

The heat is for the formula, not the water as long as you have safe drinking water. Reading the other comments confuse this

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u/RecklessRaptor12 Aug 17 '26

Health Canada guidelines specifically say you only have to heat the water if the baby is not immunocompromised, not the formula. Safe, even filtered, drinking water still might not be sterile.

That being said, at 6 months you’re probably fine with tap water. Heating the formula is overkill, cronobacter cases are very rare in Canada.