Since December, six children have passed away from adults accidentally smothering them while sleeping in the same bed. Co-sleeping is common among new parents adjusting to the demands of a newborn. Photo Courtesy: jennaanddh.blogspot.com
Melissa Carter, Executive Director, of Emory’s Barton Child Law and Policy Center says most parents don’t realize the high risk factors:
“ There’s a lot of public education that needs to happen about children not sleeping with their parents…not sleeping with a lot of soft bedding, which may seem like the right thing to do, you want your child to be soft and warm with fluffy things but that actually presents a risk to them.”
As the former state appointed Child Advocate, Carter says sleep-related child deaths are a bigger problem than maltreatment-related deaths in Georgia.
