Reports have shown that there are more than 6000 babies die of Sudden Infant Death Syndrome (SIDS) each year and out of these cases, more than 900 cases are due to babies sleeping on soft baby nursery bedding. Therefore the question, is your nursery bedding safe?
Soft baby nursery bedding can cause an infant to suffocate when the baby is being placed on her belly and her head sinks into the soft mattress. Cushy mattresses are comfortable for babies, but on the other hand, they might be dangerous too.As infants are too weak, when their heads are being laid onto a soft mattress, they might not have the ability to roll over to recover from the dangerous position. Fatal accidents might happen if nobody is around to take good care of the little one.
To avoid such accidents, parents can select a baby nursery bedding with a firm mattress that does not get depressed easily when some weight is being applied on it. They can easily do a test by pressing one hand onto the bedding to determine it’s strength in withstanding the force applied. The stronger the resistance of the bedding, the better it is.
Bumper pads, that are added in the crib, can also cause suffocation. Bumper pads make the baby nursery bedding look cute and pretty, however, suffocation can happen when infants have their face pressed against the soft and fluffy bumper pads and are unable to free themselves.
Infants are weak and vulnerable especially at these times, and parents should be more careful when it comes the safety of your child. Some people recommend to purchase bumper pads that are more compact and firm while others just remove all of them from the crib. The latter being the best method because, though no often, there are also incidents of strangulation by the long strings of the bumper pads and suffocation when babies are pressed between the bumper pads and another object.
Researchers also found that there are toxic gases in beddings which can harm the baby’s health . They discovered that there are chemical compounds that consists of phosphorous and arsenic which are commonly used as fire retardants, are being added to mattresses which can be very dangerous. Once these chemical compounds interact with certain reactants, they release poisonous gases which may be fatal if a baby breathes in a large amount of it when sleeping in the baby nursery bedding.
Scientists later found that a fungus that frequently grows in baby bedding might be one of the reactants which can help to release the poisonous gases. Therefore, they urge parents not to reuse old baby nursery bedding which may contain such fungus after being used for a long period of time. Although, infants sleep in cribs for a couple of months or longer only, parents should buy a new crib set rather than reusing to avoid the existence of such fungus. Furthermore, a new baby nursery bedding will look prettier than an old reused one.
Looking at all these factors, parents should be able to evaluate if they have a safe baby nursery bedding. If not, go get a new one and select one safe bedding so that not only will your baby be able to sleep safe and sound, but you will have a good rest every night without worries.