>Sorry for the incoherence and typos in my previous message. I was angry to
>the point of shaking when I wrote it. Another quote from the article that I
>should have included follows.
>
>"Pathologist Allan Cala at the Institute for Forensic Medicine found the
>baby's death was most likely  to be a bed-sharing sleeping accident "such
>as accidental smothering or overlaying."
>
>ie its the mums fault her baby died!!!!!!!  Why is it that unexplained
>death in a cot or bassinet is SIDS but unexplained death in the parents'
>bed is their fault?
>
>
>Karleen Gribble
>Australia


Karleen, I can understand how angry you feel at the spin put on this story,
but the basic facts of the newspaper story are probably correct.

From what we know, babies are *not* at any greater risk of SIDS if they
co-sleep with their parents (as long as the parents are not smokers). There
was a good piece in the BMJ which looked at the research in this area
(check archives - it was about 6 weeks ago).  The comment from the
researchers (either in the published paper or direct to me, as I wrote up
this story for the dayjob and interviewed one of the authors, and I can't
remember if this was said or written) was that sofa deaths - where SIDS
seemed to be higher - would probably turn out to be smothering deaths, if
there was some way of distinguishing SIDS and smothering at postmortem.

Because co-sleeping promotes bf, and allows mothers and babies to be more
tuned into each other, it may actually protect against SIDS (not that I am
aware of any research that really 'proves' that).

However, bed-sharing sleeping accidents are certainly possible - see all
the discussion on the list 2-3 months ago.

Unexplained death in a cot or bassinet may well be  more likely to be SIDS
than an accident, and unexplained death in parents' bed may well be more
likely to be an accident than SIDS. This should not be to blame the
parents....we urgently need good research that will allow us to encourage
safe co-sleeping, to minimise the risk of smothering, entrapment and other
risks.

Remember: adult beds today with adult bedding are *not* designed with
built-in safety features to protect small babies. Cots, cribs, prams and so
on are designed with these features. We need to be upfront about this, and
share with parents our knowledge of how to co-sleep so the baby is kept
safe.

Heather Welford Neil
NCT bfc Newcastle upon Tyne UK

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