Tool kit
Why are we so passive about the deaths of our babies?Every year, sixty New Zealand babies die sudden unexpected deaths as they sleep. Most babies are well and most deaths are preventable. Would we accept 60 deaths a year of healthy people from any other age group or for any other reason? We are shocked as a nation when children die at the hands of their carers, when teens are cut down by dangerous driving, when young ones take their own lives. And so we should be. Is it the loss of life that shocks us or the circumstances? Time to say goodbyeNow is the time we say goodbye, not to our babies, but to our apathy about their vulnerability, our tolerance of their deaths. It is time to farewell our ambivalence about sleep positions and our reluctance to challenge unsafe practices. It is time to move on from infancy being a stage of development shrouded with risk, and time to welcome a new era of 'survive and thrive' for babies and 'hope and confidence' for parents. The new eraIn the new era of protection, every baby is safe every time and in every place they sleep. They are safe to take their rest, have their dreams and wake, because every family knows what makes them vulnerable and every family acts to be sure they are safe. To create this reality we need to align a nation with the principles for protecting a baby's life and enable families to act to protect them. This is the purpose of the Essentials effort.
|
|
