In an advice dated 2 December 2011, the French High Council for Public Health (HCSP) defines formal indications for the unavoidable use of sterile feeding bottles and teats. 
The HCSP recalls that very premature babies, as well as hospitalised infants at times, are fed using other specific disposable materials than feeding bottles and teats, which are sterilised with ethylene oxide.
The strategies for using disposable feeding bottles and teats that are safe in infectious terms depend on the findings of risk assessments conducted in parallel by the French Agency for Food, Environmental and Occupational Health and Safety (Anses) on the ethylene oxide sterilisation process.
In this context, the HCSP has not identified a single clinical situation for which use of a sterile feeding bottle and teat in the strict sense of the term is unavoidable, for hospitalised infants, very premature newborns and infants with immune deficiency.
However, the HCSP does recommend :

• using disposable feeding bottles and teats presenting safety characteristics in view of the infectious risk, irrespective of the strategy put forward to achieve this quality.
• asking manufacturers to furnish proof of these safety characteristics in view of the infectious risk.