A sleep deprived mother wakes to the sound of a soft cry at 5:15 AM. This will be the 8th time in three hours that the mother will get up and re position her baby's binky. She just can't do this anymore. She walks in to the baby's room and notices that the child is suffering from some gas-related discomfort. Desperate, the Mother moves the baby onto her tummy. The baby moves into a little ball position and gets rid of some gas, and then falls fast asleep for two hours. Two...precious....hours.
Well according to many doctors and websites, stomach sleepers are twice as likely to die from Sudden Infant Death Syndrome ("SIDS").
Unfortunately, this is a classic example of statistical bologna. Look, I'm not suggesting that you shouldn't take precautions, or that it's a good idea to go against the American Academy of Pediatrics recommendation that "back is best." I am saying that the way the statistics are presented is bull crap.
If you look at the data, the "double risk" conclusion is based on the change in SIDS deaths after the "back to sleep" campaign in 1992-1994. SIDS rates dropped from approximately 14 deaths per 10,000 babies in 1992 down to just under 7 deaths per 10,000 babies now. Yeah, that's a 50% reduction all right! And that reduction is enough evidence for the CDC, AAP, and NHI to say that you should NEVER let your child sleep on her stomach, not even for a nap, unless she has a significant digestive disorder and your doctor tells you to try stomach sleeping.
A few things:
1: While the reduction in SIDS did accelerate after "back to sleep," the SIDS rate was already coming down. The overall infant mortality rate was also coming down quickly before the back to sleep campaign.
2: The SIDS rate continued to decrease long after the "back to sleep" campaign was commonly known among health care practitioners and new moms.
3: A massive campaign against SIDS would have increased SIDS awareness, and other preventative measures were surely taken.
4: Doctors and researchers admit they can only show a strong correlation, not a causal connection, between stomach sleeping and SIDS.
5: Not all 50% reductions are equal. If the rate changed from 22% to 11%, that would be an incredibly significant 50% reduction. In this case, the change was from 0.14% to 0.07% where at least half of the reduction occurred more than 4 years after the campaign.
6: SIDS is the third leading cause of infant death after congenital defects and low birth weight. Also, low birth weight increases the likelihood of a SIDS death, but I'm not sure which cause gets blamed.
Apparently more kids die of SIDS in the winter, even though colder room temperatures might prevent temperatures. Heaters working too well?
Black children are far more likely than white children to die of sids, and boys are more likely than girls.
A pacifier might also reduce the risk of SIDS.
SIDS rates are higher when babies sleep in the parental bed, but lower when babies sleep in a separate bed in a different room.
One theory suggests that SIDS is caused by deep sleep and brains that fail to wake babies up when oxygen levels dip too low.
When you read the SIDS sources, common words include "might" "may" and "possibly." I read an article by one doctor who said, "if we knew what caused SIDS, we wouldn't call it SIDS." Finally, some researchers think that a large part of the SIDS rate reduction was due to reclassification of suffocation deaths which used to be considered SIDS.
Again, it's better safe than sorry, but SIDS is so terrifying that we are particularly sensitive to the risks.
We aren't as sensitive in other areas. For example, my wife could conceivably never take our children out of the house. The risk of dying in a car accident is infinitely larger if you ride in cars than if you don't.
My wife could refuse to take my toddler to church or allow her to go to nursery with her little friends in order to prevent my toddler from catching something and infecting our infant.
My wife could decide to not allow anyone without a whooping cough vaccine to enter our home.
I sincerely doubt a Doctor would recommend that a mother do any of those things. Is that simply because SIDS is far more likely to result in death? Probably, but I think the manipulation of the statistics happens because SIDS is terrifying. It's so terrifying to me, that even if there were bull crap statistics that suggested I should wake up my baby every 30 minutes (which would almost certainly limit SIDS risk) I would consider it... until I fell into a sleep deprivation coma.
Thoughts?
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