General Chat

I'm watching the Born Asleep tv programme I recorded a couple of nights ago. I'm utterly enraged to see a baby viewed many times in its cot with two pillows under it's head, despite conversation with Anne Diamond who sadly lost a son to cot death.

Surely those making such a programme, largely about the devastating topic of stillbirth, would know how dangerous it is for babies to sleep with pillows in their cots? Nowadays, it is even considered safer not to have loose sheets and blankets, parents use sleep suits, it avoids loose bedding covering the child.

Apparently, as a country we rate 35th out of 37 countries for stillbirth. The Consultants were advocating adjustments in the care of pregnant women to drastically improve the stillbirth rates. Doppler scans three times during the pregnancy were recommended as being significant. Still a third of hospitals are failing women in this respect.

Having watched the programme, were I pregnant, I'd be demanding the 3 doppler scans at the recommended times of pregnancy. It would appear the NHS are dragging their heels on this matter. As Anne Diamond says, in the eighties, the government already knew of Australian research that suggested babies sleeping on their backs would be less likely to suffer sudden unexplained infant death, yet nothing was done to inform the public. Babies lives were lost, including Anne Diamond's baby son and my own. Could we be on the brink of reducing this tragic loss for stillbirth in this country by adopting better management of pregnancy at minimal cost?