Doctors Demand an Immediate Ban of Traditional Crib Bumpers
Go Mama Go Designs’ vertical railguards, Wonder Bumpers, which
tightly wrap around individual crib rails, are lauded as safe option.
SAN ANTONIO–(BUSINESS WIRE)–A new study in the Journal of Pediatrics leaves no doubt that
traditional “crib bumpers kill kids,” as stated by one of the leading
experts, Dr. Bradley Thach. Even in the title of the article, “Crib
Bumpers Continue to Cause Infant Deaths: A Need for a New Preventive
Approach,” the three researchers insist that the Consumer Product Safety
Commission (CPSC) take serious and immediate action to ban traditional
crib bumpers to prevent further deaths.
In their study
published last week, Doctors Scheers, Thach and Woodward uncovered a
total of 77 deaths, 44 from suffocation and 33 deaths from entanglement
in ties and/or between the bumper and the crib or mattress. Photographs
in the Journal of Pediatrics also show infants’ necks getting stuck on
top of the crib bumper, often happening with thinner horizontal bumpers.
The study cites that, “146 near-deaths also could have been prevented if
traditional crib bumpers had not been in the crib.” The study highlights
that it is not the thickness of the crib bumpers, but the horizontal
nature and reliance on ties that also makes them lethal – thick or thin.
Using data from the National Center for the Review and Prevention of
Child Deaths, plus the CPSC’s own data, the team uncovered that even
deaths once considered to be SIDS-related were directly caused by crib
bumpers. Including the American Academy of Pediatrics, the Center for
Disease Control and Prevention, and the National Institute of Health all
advising against crib bumper use, the scholars scorn the CPSC in their
study for simply sitting on the information, even with half the reports
based on CPSC’s data.
This second study, conducted by the same team from the 2007 study,
exposed that crib bumper deaths have more than tripled in recent years.
Such a rise does not even include the past 3 years. Furthermore, the
collection of data stems from a small amount of reported information and
considered an undercount of likely real deaths. Yet, once again, the
study questions how the CPSC somehow ignored hundreds of deaths or
near-deaths caused directly by crib bumpers and seems to question why
the government did not take the opportunity 8 years ago to prevent the
high rate of deaths we see now.
The doctors remind readers that in the face of CPSC’s lacking
leadership, the City of Chicago and the State of Maryland took matters
into their own hands and banned the sale of traditional crib bumpers
with the full support of pediatricians. It was the Coroner’s Offices of
Maryland, who could no longer endure another death report where crib
bumpers were the culprit and not do anything about it. In Maryland’s
2013 law, vertical rail guards, i.e., Wonder Bumpers, which tightly zip
around each individual crib rail and are proven safe, are exempt. In the
study’s closing remarks, Dr. Thach also lauded vertical bumpers as a
seemly safe option that provided airflow and mitigated entrapment and
climb-outs.
Wonder Bumpers have also been subjected to 3rd party clinical
studies, plus medical evaluations by two US leading infant pulmonary
experts. Their findings determined airflow in a crib with Wonder Bumpers
is comparable to one with no crib bumper, and that Wonder Bumpers
preclude any risk of suffocation or asphyxiation normally found with
traditional crib bedding. Vertical guards’ heightened, sleek, vertical
padding also protects babies’ heads and bodies while keeping limbs
safely inside.
“We applaud these scholars for their tenacity and thoroughness. It is
tragic that their initial 2007 study, which cited 27 deaths caused by
crib bumpers, did not lead to an immediate federal ban by the CPSC,
which has yet to take any action,” laments Georgia Fiebrich, founder of
Go Mama Go Designs, which has long advocated for safer bedding
regulations. “How can this be? How can a lobbying group like the
Juvenile Products Manufacturers Association so influence a federal
agency that it does not take the critical action it is specifically
charged to do? Where is their accountability? Why are people afraid to
talk about this issue? Yes, it’s very sensitive but there are lives at
stake. The CPSC’s allegiance should be only to these babies and their
families. They obviously failed to respond appropriately the first time.
If they do not act now, they will have even more deaths to answer to.”
Contacts
Go Mama Go Designs
Georgia Fiebrich, 202-251-9293
georgia@gomamagodesigns.com
