ARGH! Some articles are so badly put together. They need to just tell everyone what the safe sleeping guidelines are! Because it is safe when done appropriately just like cot sleeping! But it is the media - drama drama for the story...

Bad advice puts babes at risk
Article from: The Courier-Mail
Janelle Miles

July 04, 2007 12:00am

AUSTRALIAN babies are continuing to die because of unsafe sleeping environments, such as sharing a bed with their parents, experts warn.

Despite sudden infant death syndrome cases dramatically falling in recent years, experts believe some parents are being given inconsistent safety messages which may put babies at risk of suffocating in their sleep.

In a letter to the latest Medical Journal of Australia, mortuary worker Glenda Cairn, a new mother, said she was alarmed when she rang a health advice service about her child's sleeping problems and was told to take the baby to bed with her.

When she explained she had seen babies who had suffocated in bed with their parents, the response was: "Don't worry about it, it doesn't happen very often."

University of Adelaide pathology professor Roger Byard questioned the responsibility of organisations giving such advice when it put children at risk of death.

"If you get a couple of parents who are overweight, really tired, or intoxicated and the baby is between them with soft mattresses and coverings, that's a very dangerous situation," Professor Byard said.

He said that if parents wanted their babies close by at night, they should put the cot near their bed.

"The baby can stay in the cot, you can touch the baby, they can hear you and you can interact," Professor Byard said.

"But the baby is protected in its own environment."

Professor Byard also warned parents against allowing their babies to sleep with V-shaped pillows, often recommended to mothers for breastfeeding.

"The problem is if the baby is left to sleep between the two arms of the pillow, it can wiggle down between the sides and that's when they suffocate," he said.

"Ideally, babies should sleep on firm mattresses with no pillows."

In 1998, the South Australian coroner recommended a public warning be issued against the use of V-shaped pillows by infants aged under two.

But Professor Byard said the pillows were still being sold in the foyer of at least one obstetric hospital.