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Tag: SIDS

  • “Bernie Baby,” Four-Month-Old Bernie Sanders Lookalike, Dies of SIDS

    “Bernie Baby,” the four-month-old baby dressed up to resemble Bernie Sanders at a political rally, died of Sudden Infant Death Syndrome (SIDS) on February 25.

    Oliver Jack Carter Lomas-Davis was Bernie Baby. His aunt confirmed his passing in an interview with the Associated Press.

    Bernie Baby quickly became an internet sensation when photos of him wearing a messy white wig and black rimmed glasses were shared online. He met Bernie Sanders at a rally in Los Angeles.

    Babies for Bernie 2016 Oliver Jack Carter Lomas

    A photo posted by Susan Lomas (@sflomas) on

    Michael Briggs, a spokesman for Bernie Sanders, learned of Bernie Baby’s passing and said the campaign planned to issue a statement.

    “It’s very sad,” Briggs added.

    Bernie Baby’s funeral is planned for Tuesday at 12:30 p.m. at Forest Lawn Hollywood Hills Church of the Hills.

    Everyone who met or viewed pictures of Bernie Baby no doubt experienced joy at the sight of the baby boy. His family and others who knew him are surely experiencing unspeakable grief in light of his untimely passing.

  • U.S. to Create New Young Death Registry

    The death of a child is rarely expected and sometimes hard to explain. Health professionals in the U.S. are now trying to determine just how widespread the impact of such deaths are in the country – and what can be done about it.

    The U.S. National Institutes of Health (NIH) today announced that it is partnering with the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) to create a registry of all child deaths in the U.S. The system, called the Sudden Death in the Young Registry, will be an extension of the CDC’s Sudden Unexpected Infant Death Case Registry. It will track the deaths of infants, children, teens, and young adults, compiling as much data on each case as possible.

    “The sudden death of a child is tragic and the impact on families and society is incalculable,” said Dr. Jonathan Kaltman, chief of the Heart Development and Structural Diseases division at the NIH’s National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute (NHLBI). “This registry will collect comprehensive, population-based information on sudden unexpected death in youths up to age 24 in the United States. It is a critical first step toward figuring out how to best prevent these tragedies.”

    The new registry will be, in addition to other causes, collect data on sudden cardiac death and sudden unexpected death in epilepsy in the young. According to the NIH, data on these deaths are not reported on , and collecting them will help doctors determine the risk factors and causes of such deaths. It could also help formulate preventative strategies to prevent deaths in the future.

    Data on the child deaths will be reviewed by teams in each of the states participating in the registry, and then compiled by a panel of medical experts for standardization. The standardized data will be stored in a centralized database managed by the Michigan Public Health Institute, and collected blood samples will be stored in a centralized biorepository.

  • Incidence of Infants Sharing a Bed Rising, Says NIH

    The NIH this week revealed results from the National Infant Sleep Position Study that show that the incidence of infants sharing a bed with an adult or another child has more than doubled over the past two decades. Nearly 14% of infant caregivers surveyed in 2010 stated that their baby regularly shared a bed with another person. This is up from just 6.5% who said the same thing back in 1993.

    The practice of infants sleeping with adults is known to increase the risk of sudden infant death syndrome (SIDS), the unexplained death of an infant. Doctors recommend that infants sleep in the same room as parents, but not in the same bed.

    The new study, published in the Journal of the American Medical Association Pediatrics, also shows there is a wide disparity in infant bed-sharing practices across different ethnic groups. Though the practice increased for all ethnic groups, only 9.1% of white infants were found to share a bed in 2010. This is less than half of the 20.5% of Hispanic infants that were reported to share a bed in 2010, and far less than the 38.7% of black babies that reported to share a bed that same year.

    “The disparity in nighttime habits has increased in recent years,” said Dr. Eve Colson, first author on the study and a researcher at the Yale University School of Medicine. “Because African-American infants are already at increased risk for SIDS, this trend is a cause for concern.”

    The study’s authors suggest that advice from doctors can reduce the practice of infant bed-sharing. The study found that parents who knew their doctor was against sleeping with an infant were more than one-third less likely to say they share a bed with their baby.

    “It’s important for doctors to discuss sleeptime habits with new parents in order to convey the risks of bed sharing clearly,” said Marian Willinger, co-author of the study and a SIDS researcher at the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development.