# "co-sleeping is key culprit in SIDS"



## Mama_2_Boy (Jun 18, 2007)

I just know I'm going to get a phone call from my mother today.

This article is so slanted! The title of the article should read "drunk, coked up parents co sleeping with their infants can result in SIDS".
I'm just so disappointed to see this article worded the way it is.









http://ca.news.yahoo.com/s/afp/09101...mortality_sids


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## StrawberryFields (Apr 6, 2005)

You know what always confuses me about these articles/statements? If the parent is co-sleeping, drunk, on drugs, whatever, and rolls over on the baby, or baby gets wedged somewhere, how is that SIDS? Isn't that actually suffocation, smothering, etc.?? I find it hard to believe that the parent having too much to drink and placing baby in a family bed has resulted in a completely unexplainable sudden death of the infant.


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## Ruthla (Jun 2, 2004)

And they defined co-sleeping as "sharing a bed *or sofa* with a parent." I wish they'd studied this more carefully, and separated out the sober babies in beds from the ones on sofas and/or with a drunk or drugged parent.


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## Norasmomma (Feb 26, 2008)

These "studies" are always so slanted toward the side of co-sleeping causes SIDS, but in reality if a parent is sleeping with a baby and they smoke, drink and do drugs that is actually the cause. Uh the key culprit to me would be parents consuming drugs, alcohol and smoking-not so much the sleeping aspect. What a crock of sh**.

It's just another piece of propaganda to instill fear of co-sleeping, but in reality if this article is actually read it shows that drunk parents shouldn't sleep with their babies.


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## fruitfulmomma (Jun 8, 2002)

If your kid suffocates because he fell between the couch cushion or got smothered by you while you were drunk he did NOT DIE FROM SIDS!!!

From the American SIDS institute:

Quote:

*SIDS* is the sudden death of an infant under one year of age which remains unexplained after a thorough case investigation, including performance of a complete autopsy, examination of the death scene, and review of the clinical history. (_Willinger et al, 1991_).
If they know these children were suffocated by a parent or object, the death is NOT unexplained. If they can not separate true SIDS from explainable deaths from suffocation, they have no business conducting a study on the issue and certainly no business reporting their "findings" to the media.


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## mamansolo (Oct 9, 2009)

I haven't read the article but suffocation is extremely different from SIDS and therelies often the problem with these studies. They mix everything together while they should be kept perfectly separate. Sigh.


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## Valkyrie9 (Sep 29, 2006)

The part that spun me up is that they're saying "most" cases of SIDS occurred during co-sleeping, but then you see that the actual percentage is 54%. I'll bet you could get a 4% variance in gender with the same study, so then you could turn around and say, "Boys more likely to die of SIDS."

And it scarcely points out that the other 46% of the fatalities happened in non-co-sleeping situations: what about them? Where are the answers for those families? Why not just say, "We still don't know WTH causes SIDS because there are no clear, defining factors"?!?!

(I knew as soon as I read this article I could come here and rant about it.)


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## Super~Single~Mama (Sep 23, 2008)

What about the part saying that its preventable by more parental education?

Umm....I don't need my high school diploma, bachelors degree, or my 2.5years of law school to tell me that drinking/smoking/sleeping on the sofa with my baby is a BAD BAD BAD idea.


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## Sheryl1678 (Sep 15, 2006)

Because admitting that _safe_ cosleeping can reduce the risk of SIDS wont sell very many cribs.


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## Zimbah (Feb 22, 2008)

As per usual, very bad reporting of what seems to me to be pretty good science (or at least nothing glaringly wrong, unlike most news reports). The published research is available here:

http://www.bmj.com/cgi/content/full/339/oct13_1/b3666

One of the conclusions is that giving general advice not to co-sleep may result in more people accidentally falling asleep on the sofa with their baby (exhausted parent trying to feed the baby but afraid to feed in bed) and putting them at risk - they conclude it would be better to warn about specific risks (no pillows etc), and of course never to co-sleep after taking drugs or alcohol. Some papers here have reported it properly, but of course most have gone for the quick headline


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## fruitfulmomma (Jun 8, 2002)

From the BMJ page...

Quote:

More mothers of SIDS infants than random control infants smoked during pregnancy (60% _v_ 14%), whereas one quarter of the SIDS infants were preterm (26% _v_ 5%) or were in fair or poor health for the last sleep (28% _v_ 6%)
More than half of these mothers were smokers. Research on *safe* bedsharing has consistently shown that mothers who smoked during pregnancy should not bedshare. We know that smoking also increases risk of preterm birth and poor health in the child. Perhaps instead of blaming and shaming safe bedsharing families, we could spend more time helping women of childbearing age to stop smoking.


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## anne1140 (Apr 10, 2007)

Quote:


Originally Posted by *Valkyrie9* 
The part that spun me up is that they're saying "most" cases of SIDS occurred during co-sleeping, but then you see that the actual percentage is 54%. I'll bet you could get a 4% variance in gender with the same study, so then you could turn around and say, "Boys more likely to die of SIDS."

And it scarcely points out that the other 46% of the fatalities happened in non-co-sleeping situations: what about them? Where are the answers for those families? Why not just say, "We still don't know WTH causes SIDS because there are no clear, defining factors"?!?!

(I knew as soon as I read this article I could come here and rant about it.)

Well, I just need to point out that this isn't entirely accurate. What you're saying would be true if 50% of the babies studied co-slept and 50% did not, but as the study states, 20% co-slept and 80% did not.

For the sake of even numbers, let's just say:

200 babies co-slept
800 babies did not co-sleep
_______________________
Total=1000 babies studied

100 of the babies died from "SIDS"
54 of those babies co-slept
46 of those babies did not co-sleep

If you bring those numbers back to the original:
54 of the 200 co-sleeping babies died (or 27%)
46 of the 800 non-co-sleeping babies died (or 5.75%)

There you see, in their study, the death numbers actually were significantly higher for the co-sleeping babies.

HOWEVER...
I am not supporting this article. Just pointing out the flaw with the argument.

I do think it's ridiculous to classify suffocation as SIDS, and I also think it's ridiculous that they admit many of the parents co-sleeping who did smother their babies were under the influence of something. If they wanted to conduct an accurate study, they should have just done it with people who co-sleep the way it is recommended.

My theory on this whole thing is that the states and organizations who are pushing for "Baby sleeps best ALONE" are concerned about those who are co-sleeping unsafely, and it's just easier to say, "Don't do it" rather than educate on the proper way of co-sleeping. Not to say that it's right...but that's why I think it happens. Also, misinterpretation of poor studies (such as this one), which, as we know, has happened with the CDC considering circumcision promotion....


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## noobmom (Jan 19, 2008)

Quote:


Originally Posted by *anne1140* 
My theory on this whole thing is that the states and organizations who are pushing for "Baby sleeps best ALONE" are concerned about those who are co-sleeping unsafely, and it's just easier to say, "Don't do it" rather than educate on the proper way of co-sleeping.

Sadly, this happens all the time. No one who knows anything about nutrition ever thought all fats were bad. But it was just easier for the government to push the "low fat" message in the 80s and 90s than to try to explain to people the difference between good and bad fats.


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## amii (Oct 30, 2009)

Quote:


Originally Posted by *fruitfulmomma* 
From the BMJ page...

More than half of these mothers were smokers. Research on *safe* bedsharing has consistently shown that mothers who smoked during pregnancy should not bedshare. We know that smoking also increases risk of preterm birth and poor health in the child. Perhaps instead of blaming and shaming safe bedsharing families, we could spend more time helping women of childbearing age to stop smoking.

I struggled to quit smoking, and managed to do so by 20 weeks pregnant. I currently bedshare, and am wondering how dangerous this really is? I had never heard of this before, and am now terrified to go to sleep tonight?!


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## zensven42 (Oct 26, 2006)

random news articles are not usually very well researched nowadays and are mainly sensationalistic, in order to get people to read them.

Here are some well researched papers with info regarding this subject

http://www.nd.edu/~jmckenn1/lab/arti...should%20n.pdf

more here: http://www.nd.edu/~jmckenn1/lab/articles.html

Can't find any research that suggests cosleeping itself results in SIDS.

Tell her to better evaluate the source of her info next time. Anyone can find random "news" articles proving just about anything if they try hard enough. I bet I could find someone stating that the sky is red and women are aliens....doesn't make it true. If she wants more accurate info, she should read the actual entire paper that this story is quoting.

This is interesting: Why couldn't they make something like this in the US instead of just telling people to use a crib? http://www.nd.edu/~jmckenn1/lab/pamphlets/zealand.html

Oh that's right, because most of these sleep studies are funded by corporations who sell cribs, crib items, pacifiers, and other crap like that. Wouldn't want them to lose any profits eh?


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## zensven42 (Oct 26, 2006)

OK, here is what I can get from the study so far:

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/1...m&ordinalpos=1

Looks like their results do not state that cosleeping was the major factor in the SIDS deaths, but rather smoking during pregnancy (huge difference!), drug use, and UNSAFE cosleeping conditions such swaddling, sleeping on a sofa, and using pillows. (CONCLUSIONS: Many of the SIDS infants had coslept in a hazardous environment. The major influences on risk, regardless of markers for socioeconomic deprivation, are amenable to change and specific advice needs to be given, particularly on use of alcohol or drugs before cosleeping and cosleeping on a sofa)

It is quite obvious that the "news" article spun the facts to make it appear as if cosleeping itself was the main problem---sensationalism as usual. How rude.


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## maygee (Dec 22, 2006)

Quote:


Originally Posted by *zensven42* 
random news articles are not usually very well researched nowadays and are mainly sensationalistic, in order to get people to read them.

Here are some well researched papers with info regarding this subject

http://www.nd.edu/~jmckenn1/lab/arti...should%20n.pdf

more here: http://www.nd.edu/~jmckenn1/lab/articles.html

Can't find any research that suggests cosleeping itself results in SIDS.

Tell her to better evaluate the source of her info next time. Anyone can find random "news" articles proving just about anything if they try hard enough. I bet I could find someone stating that the sky is red and women are aliens....doesn't make it true. If she wants more accurate info, she should read the actual entire paper that this story is quoting.

This is interesting: Why couldn't they make something like this in the US instead of just telling people to use a crib? http://www.nd.edu/~jmckenn1/lab/pamphlets/zealand.html

Oh that's right, because most of these sleep studies are funded by corporations who sell cribs, crib items, pacifiers, and other crap like that. Wouldn't want them to lose any profits eh?

That just looks like a bassinet or arms reach cosleeper pushed up next to the bed to me.


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## fruitfulmomma (Jun 8, 2002)

Amii - I think something like the Arms Reach co-sleeper would work for your family. It is similar to the one pictured the the link above for the pamphlet given out in New Zealand.


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## zensven42 (Oct 26, 2006)

I wasn't referring to the item in the photo (I hadn't even looked at it) I was talking about a pamphlet educating parents about safe ways of cosleeping as opposed to just telling them not to do it at all.


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## ssh (Aug 12, 2007)

Quote:


Originally Posted by *amii* 
I struggled to quit smoking, and managed to do so by 20 weeks pregnant. I currently bedshare, and am wondering how dangerous this really is? I had never heard of this before, and am now terrified to go to sleep tonight?!

You shouldn't bedshare if you still smoke because smokers exhale toxins during their sleep. Quitting at 20 weeks, all the toxins should be out of your system long before your baby was born.


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## sapphire_chan (May 2, 2005)

Quote:


Originally Posted by *amii* 
I struggled to *quit smoking, and managed to do so* by 20 weeks pregnant. I currently bedshare, and am wondering how dangerous this really is? I had never heard of this before, and am now terrified to go to sleep tonight?!

You're fine.







And congratulations on your successful effort and your new baby!


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