Today, I received an email from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention about a roundtable webinar that will be held in a week for health professionals on Safe Sleep for Babies which BeChildSafe.org will lean in and listen to, but I wanted to share the statistics CDC shared with the public just now about Safe Sleep and why it’s so important to make sure babies have a safe sleep environment:
“Each year about 3,500 babies in the United States die suddenly and unexpectedly before they reach their first birthday due to sleep-related deaths. These tragedies, called sudden unexpected infant death (SUID), often occur during sleep or in the baby’s sleep area, and include sudden infant death syndrome (SIDS), accidental suffocation and strangulation in bed, and other deaths from unknown causes.”
“In the 1990s, a dramatic reduction in sleep-related infant deaths followed the release of recommendations and campaigns including Back to Sleep (now known as Safe to Sleep®). However, rates of SUIDs have remained relatively flat since 2001 and … disparities persist. Differences in how the causes of these deaths are reported limit our understanding and prevention efforts.” (CDC, Public Health Grand Rounds, will be held October 23, 2018 at 1:00 p.m.)
Following the Grand Roundtable, we will publish recommendations on Safe Sleep for Babies, some of which are:
Make sure baby is lying on his/her back.
If a blanket is necessary, have only one cover in the baby’s bed.
Remove toys and stuffed animals and anything baby could choke on, from the bed.
Do not place the crib or baby bed next to a window or where there are window blinds.(if you have window blinds, make sure if there are blind cords, all blind cords are tied up high where baby cannot reach)
Make sure that there are no pockets between the crib mattress and the crib sides, head and footboards that baby could roll into and become stuck.
Make sure your crib mattress pad is fitted and will not allow baby to get tangled.
Make sure crib closures are safely tightened (bolt/nuts/screws) with no gaps.
Make sure crib slats are not so wide baby can get stuck between them.
Do not place the baby in bed with you and/or with you and your partner.
