feedback for "Parental Advisory: Full of Hot Air?"
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Where is the research disproving the New Zealand theory? Since NZ started the mattress wrapping campaign in 1994, there have been no SIDS deaths for infants with wrapped mattresses (around 100,000 mattresses), yet the rest of the "unwrapped" still is experiencing SIDS. I just find it odd that no serious study has been done outside of NZ on this. I think the study the writer is referring to is a study of gases performed on mattress back in 1998 and they say they didn't find any gases coming from the mattresses. But why doesn't the US run a controlled study of wrapped vs. unwrapped mattresses and see what happens? It just bothers me that the US is dismissing it so quickly without any research. I'm not saying this IS the cause, I'm just saying it shouldn't be dismissed as "disproven."
I read about this study when my son was 6 months old. Had I known about it sooner, I probably would have wrapped his mattress. I followed every other SIDs precaution - back to sleep, breastfeeding, not smoking, use a pacifier, no bumper pads, no toys in the crib, no blanket, etc. So why not add this one to the list? At least this one has some positive results behind it...like a WHOLE country seeing a decrease in SIDs because of its use.
posted by : trygo on 10/31/2007 at 1:50 PM Flag For Abuse
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Leading SIDS organizations in the US and UK have dismissed a link between toxins and SIDS. The Foundation for the Study of Infant Deaths in the UK states: "The overall conclusion was that there was no evidence to substantiate the toxic gas hypothesis that antimony- and phosphorus-containing compounds used as fire retardants in PVC and other cot mattress materials are a cause of SIDS." The SIDS Alliance in the US says the same thing. That doesn't mean the NZ study is wrong, but at this point it's not a widely accepted theory in the US or UK.
UK link: http://web.archive.org/web/20001026033455/http://www.sids.org.uk/fsid/limerick.htm
US link: http://firstcandle.org/FC-PDF4/Research_Position%20Statements/toxic%20gas%20theor…es%20and%20sid.pdf
posted by : ceridwenmorris on 11/2/2007 at 6:36 PM Flag For Abuse
