To prevent infant death due to unsafe sleep practices
LOS ANGELES – In Los Angeles County, approximately one baby dies every 5 days due to suffocation from bed-sharing and unsafe sleep practices, representatives from Inter-Agency Council on Child Abuse and Neglect (ICAN) and the Los Angeles County said on Wednesday.
At a press conference held at the California Hospital Medical Center, ICAN Executive Director Deanne Tilton Durfee, together with officials from the LA County Department of Public Health and the Department of Coroner, reminded parents of the dangers of unsafe sleeping practices that often result in the leading preventable cause of deaths in children.
Every year, as many as 70 infant deaths are reported due to suffocation, when they are placed in a cluttered crib, an adult bed, or even a couch by well-meaning parents or caregivers.
Oftentimes, children are put to sleep with too much clutter around them: pillows, stuffed toys, and blankets.
Sometimes, babies are put to sleep on their stomachs or sides.
From 2008 to 2011, a total of 278 deaths due to suffocation due to bed-sharing and unsafe sleep have been reported.
Some infants have died while sleeping in an adult bed with their parents. When a baby cries, the parents’ first instinct is to console the child, and bring it to bed with them.
Sometimes, when the parent is too tired, he or she falls asleep with the baby on the bed. The parent may accidentally roll over the baby, or put his or her arm over its chest and face area, suffocating the child.
“These infants are unable to walk, or talk, or lift their heads up from under a pillow, a stuffed animal, or another person,” Durfee pointed out. She added that accidental suffocation poses the greatest risk for babies aged 1 day to 1 year.
In fact, more babies under one are dying from suffocation due to unsafe sleeping than all accidental deaths of children under age 14.
According to newly released data from 2011, 68 accidental child deaths resulted from a wide-range of causes, including drug intake/overdose, medical complications, crushed child, fire, falls, automobile related deaths, and drowning, among others. Meanwhile, 69 deaths were reported from unsafe sleep-related suffocation alone.
Bed-sharing and unsafe sleep accounted for 62 percent of all undetermined child deaths in LA county in 2011. Of that number, 32 percent of deaths was due to bed-sharing, while 24 percent was due to unsafe sleeping environments like couches, pillows, soft or excessive bedding, and stuffed toys, among other things.
According to Dr. Jonathan Fielding, LA County director of public health, three service planning areas (SPAs) accounted for the majority of these deaths: South Bay/Harbor area (28 percent), South LA (24 percent), and San Fernando Valley (16 percent). A vast majority of bed-sharing and unsafe sleep child deaths were infants between 0-6 months of age.
“For the first 3-4 months of life, babies can only breathe through their noses and do not have the strength to lift their heads. When sleeping face down, or when their face is pressed against a soft object, they can suffocate easily,” Fielding said in a statement.
Safe Sleep for Baby campaign
“Nothing else is more dangerous to babies than the way they are put to sleep,” Durfee said, “Not drowning, not poisoning, not motor vehicle accidents, not child abuse and neglect.”
“Many parents know they should not leave young children alone in the bathtub. They need to place medications and household cleaning products out of reach, and [there] is a law to have a [child] car seat in the vehicle.”
“But everyone else needs to know to be just as careful when putting babies to sleep,” Durfee said.
As a response to these alarming numbers on accidental infant deaths, ICAN Associates, in partnership with First Five LA will launch the Safe Sleep for Baby campaign.
The key element to this campaign is to acquire a deeper understanding of how and why these babies are dying.
According to Durfee, ICAN conducted studies among Latina and African American moms and grandmothers on what they knew and said or didn’t know after their children died.
Based on studies and focus groups, the word “suffocation” elicited a strong response from the parents, enough to motivate them to adopt safe sleeping practices.
Safe Sleep for Baby will be a county-wide advertising campaign which starts on Monday, May 13, and is expected to raise awareness on the proper habits and practices that would ensure a safe sleeping environment for infants.
The campaign will emphasize four key reminders to help parents prevent accidental suffocation when sleeping: 1.) Share a room, not a bed; 2.) Lay your baby down to sleep in a crib or bassinet; 3.) Place babies on their back every time – at night time and for naps; and 4.) Give babies space to breathe – avoid pillows, bumpers, blankets, or toys.
Since a majority of the families afflicted by accidental infant deaths through suffocation are Latino and African American, the campaign will focus on these groups with radio and TV commercials in English and in Spanish.
According to Durfee, this seemingly disproportionate distribution of accidental deaths among Latinos and African Americans cannot be directly related to ethnicity, but pointed out that incorrect practices handed down form generation to generation may be the root cause.
Eviana Magee, mother of baby Brielle Brookins who died in March 2009 due to unsafe sleep, said that other parents should know that there’s something they can do to prevent this kind of tragedy.
“Place your babies on their back. And no pillows, no clutter, no anything in the crib,” Magee emphasized. She also indicated that it’s important for parents to gain more knowledge about the risks of unsafe sleep, unlike her when Brielle passed away.
“I’ve heard of it [unsafe sleep], but I don’t know any information about it. I’ve heard about SIDS [sudden infant death syndrome], but I didn’t know anything about it,” Magee recalled.
(www.asianjournal.com)
(LA Weekend May 11-14, 2013 Sec. A pg.7)