Baby sleeping position
Cot-death  Child Health

[Anne Diamond ¹ , a UK TV presenter, went to New Zealand and picked up the baby-on-back sleeping position that cut UK cot-deaths, missing out neighbour Australia (29 times it's size) where Archie Kalokerinos M.D had discovered the Vitamin C  cure in the 60's.  It is typical the Allopaths would claim credit for stopping something they created in the first place.  Vitamin C would expose Vaccines as being the main source of cot-death, and Vitamin C as a medicine has to be suppressed at all cost as it would destroy Allopathy Inc through Nutritional Medicine (see Vitamin C Conspiracy).]

"There's only one problem with this story. It was the medical profession who persuaded parents to sleep their babies on the front from the late 1950's in the first place. Now they claim credit for saving 3,000 babies, because they reversed their own advice to what mothers used to do before. Scientists told them they were being ignorant and should sleep their babies on their front. Sigh. A bit rich."---Hilary Butler

Cot death rate drops, but more to be done

13/08/2012

http://www.stuff.co.nz/national/health/7470007/Cot-death-rate-drops-but-more

Researchers say an estimated 3000 cot deaths have been prevented by changes
to sleeping positions for babies, but even more lives could be saved.

Writing in the New Zealand Medical Journal, they said more focus was needed
on the risk of infants sleeping in the same bed as their parents.

Auckland University professor of child health research Edwin Mitchell and
Bristol University senior research fellow Peter Blair described the
prevention of sudden infant death syndrome (SIDS) as "one of the major
success stories in epidemiology".

They calculate the lives of 3075 babies were saved between 1990 and 2008,
while the SIDS rate dropped from more than four per 1000 babies in the
late-1980s to less than one, and the annual number of SIDS deaths dropped
from 219 in 1985 to 50.

The fall in mortality from SIDS had been attributed to the change in infant
sleep position, initially from sleeping on the stomach to sleeping on the
side, and then to predominantly sleeping on the back.

Similar calculations done overseas put the number of lives saved in England
and Wales at more than 17,000, with more than 40,000 saved in the United
States.

"It is hard to think of any other intervention in the developed world that
has had such a dramatic, rapid and clear cut effect," the authors said.

Now, parents needed to be given clear evidence-based guidance on the risks
of bed sharing. In particular specific risks associated with hazardous bed
sharing needed to be clearly spelt out.

"Inappropriate sleep surfaces such as soft mattresses and sofas should be
avoided and parents need to be reminded to never bring the baby into bed if
they have recently consumed alcohol or taken legal or illegal sleep-inducing
drugs."

Surveys in Auckland found that under 50 per cent of mothers of infants
identified the risk of SIDS with bed sharing.

Two retrospective studies of infant deaths referred to the coroner in
Wellington and Auckland showed that more than 50 per cent of all sudden
unexpected deaths in infancy happened while bed sharing, with the figure 90
per cent in the first month of life.

The authors noted some resistance to the promotion of advice not to sleep in
the same bed with babies. Some groups had actively encouraged bed sharing to
encourage and maintain breastfeeding, and there was emerging evidence of a
complex interdependent relationship between the two infant care practices.

"Modelling of appropriate infant care practices in obstetric hospitals is
crucial. If parents are encouraged to bed share in obstetric units to
facilitate breastfeeding, one cannot be surprised if this practice continues
when the mother and baby go home."

The most risk-free environment for infant sleeping was in a cot next to the
parental bed.

A study was under way into the ideal of enabling parents and babies to sleep
safely in the same bed, but it would be three to four years before results
were available.

- C Fairfax NZ News