A bunch of years back, a relative who was an assistant district
attorney served on the Governor's commission to study SIDS in the
state where we live.  My relative reported that in looking through
medical and legal files, the commission concluded that an astounding number
of infant deaths were ruled "SIDS", when in fact the deaths were
intentional suffocations inflicted by the parents.

This problem is exacerbated and hidden by several glitches in the
system, including the fact that (at the time in our state) one only
needs to have a driver's license and be 18 years of age in order to
be a coroner.

Therefore, someone with very little life experience and even less
training can end up being in charge of making some very specific
medical/ legal determinations.  In addition, poor linkages of social
agencies, and even poorer access to inter-agency files let some
pretty severe situations fall through the cracks, namely, a huge
number of cases in which families had two-plus "SIDS" incidents,
which were often undetected homicides.  Alcohol and drug use also
play a part in these "SIDS" incidents.

I think the prevalence of *this problem* underscores our
culturally-specific fear of co-sleeping.  That is, folks hear about
these cases of "SIDS" in the media, and automatically assume that
somebody rolled over by accident and killed the baby.
Short of being drugged within an inch of my life, I can't imagine not
being aware of the baby's every move while co-sleeping!

Plenty of literature supports safe (ie, no drugs, no etoh)
co-sleeping of breastfeeding mother-baby pairs can be much safer than
having 3-day old baby asleep upstairs alone!
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      Bill Herring and/or Gina Bailey-Herring
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