{"id":18334,"date":"2011-02-22T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2011-02-22T00:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/getirshelp.com\/blog\/debate-irs-breastfeeding-supplies-rule\/"},"modified":"2026-07-24T22:02:21","modified_gmt":"2026-07-24T22:02:21","slug":"debate-irs-breastfeeding-supplies-rule","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/getirshelp.com\/blog\/debate-irs-breastfeeding-supplies-rule\/","title":{"rendered":"Debate over IRS Breastfeeding Supplies Rule"},"content":{"rendered":"

Stop losing sleep over your tax situation. I'm Darrin Mish \u2014 a tax attorney in Tampa who's spent 32 years handling exactly this kind of problem. Here's what you need to know.<\/p>\n

All the while, breastfeeding supplies were never allowed as tax-deductible items. \u00a0This was because breast milk is considered a nutritional food and not medication. \u00a0But recently, there was a change in the ruling. \u00a0Now the IRS made expenses for breastfeeding supplies like breast pumps, bottles etc a tax-deductible expense. \u00a0This made many pediatricians, doctors, nursing mothers and pro-breastfeeding organizations very happy. \u00a0This change coincided with First Lady, Michelle Obama supporting the call for nursing mothers to breastfeed as part of her campaign against child obesity.<\/div>\n
However, this did not go down well with certain quarters. \u00a0Rep. Michele Bachmann (R-Minn) claims the First Lady\u2019s stand is \u2018hard left\u2019 and suggested she was creating a \u2018nanny state\u2019. \u00a0In the same way, Sarah Palin made light of First Lady Obama\u2019s support for breastfeeding. \u00a0At a recent speech, she said, \u201cNo wonder Michelle Obama is telling everybody, ‘You’d better breast-feed your baby,’ \u00a0Yeah, you’d better, because the price of milk is so high right now.\u201d<\/div>\n
The new rule states that nursing mothers can claim tax deductions for expenses on breastfeeding supplies if their total medical expenses are higher than 7.5% of the total adjusted gross income or if they have flexible spending accounts.<\/div>\n
The rule has found support from many quarters like the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) who has lobbied for years to get the government to classify breastfeeding equipment as medical supplies. \u00a0Likewise, the Surgeon General Regina M. Benjamin in her statement, \u201cCall to Action to Support Breastfeeding\u201d, strongly recommended that nursing mothers breastfeed their infants stating that breastfeeding helps to ward off child asthma, diarrhea, pneumonia and child obesity.<\/div>\n
More support for breastfeeding came from the Alleghany County Health Department that every year awards businesses and public premises that accommodate breastfeeding. \u00a0The Department recognizes the crucial role the IRS ruling plays in helping nursing mothers afford the items they need to breastfeed. \u00a0The department\u2019s spokesman, Guillermo Cole expressed regret that the IRS ruling has been politicized. \u00a0The department\u2019s view is that this issue has nothing to do with politics but has everything to do with encouraging breastfeeding for those who wish to do so, something that benefits all regardless of their political persuasion.<\/div>\n
Likewise, Dr. Richard Schandler, the chairman of the AAP breastfeeding section said the association supports breastfeeding because of its health benefit, not out of any political agenda. \u00a0Dr. Schandler said, \u201cThe government isn’t legislating that women breast-feed, they’re just making it easier, like they’ve made it easier to get antibiotics for all children.\u201d<\/div>\n

Check out more Tax Related News<\/a> stories by clicking that link.<\/p>\n

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Stop losing sleep over your tax situation. I'm Darrin Mish \u2014 a tax attorney in Tampa who's spent 32 years handling exactly this kind of problem. Here's what you need to know. All the while, breastfeeding supplies were never allowed as tax-deductible items. \u00a0This was because breast milk is considered a nutritional food and not […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"rop_custom_images_group":[],"rop_custom_messages_group":[],"rop_publish_now":"initial","rop_publish_now_accounts":[],"rop_publish_now_history":[],"rop_publish_now_status":"pending","footnotes":""},"categories":[591],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-18334","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-irs-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/getirshelp.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18334","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/getirshelp.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/getirshelp.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/getirshelp.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/getirshelp.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=18334"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/getirshelp.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18334\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":21922,"href":"https:\/\/getirshelp.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18334\/revisions\/21922"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/getirshelp.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=18334"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/getirshelp.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=18334"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/getirshelp.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=18334"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}