Speak Out: Would You Let Your Baby Go Diaperless?

For parents concerned about the environment, the choice of diapers is a tough one.

Disposable diapers take a long time to biodegrade and cloth diapers require lots of laundry cycles.

Some parents' solution? Eliminate the diaper altogether.

The New York Times recently reported that some parents are foregoing diapers for their babies altogether and choosing to implement “elimination communication.”

Parents practicing elimination communication with their children watch for cues from their kids when they have to go to the bathroom.

The parents themselves then make noises – for example, a grunt or a “sss” sound. The idea is to get their children to associate those noises with the need to go.

Eventually, adherents say, you'll be able to hold your kid over a toilet or sink, make the noise and the baby will go on command.

Many elimination communication-practicing parents begin training their children at birth.

Those practicing elimination communication say their babies don't go diaperless all the time and admit the system is not perfect, but say that cleaning up the occasional accident is still better than endless diaper changing.

They say other cultures have been practicing elimination communication for hundreds of years.

NBC News reports that experts Child Study Center at the University of Oklahoma Health Sciences Center are skeptical that children under the age of 12 months would have any bladder control at all, and little control for the following six months of age.

New York Health Department officials told the NYT that the issue is a sanitation one, not a health concern.

Speak Out: What do you think of babies going diaperless? Do you or anyone you know practice elimination communication? If you had to raise your kids all over again, would you go this route?

Tell us in the comments!