Irresponsible and unhelpful article about baby’s death?

Simple. What you learn from this is: to become a responsible parent you don’t drink to excess where you are incapable of looking after your baby/child/children.

You want to know warning signs to look for: Parent your baby, feed them, change their nappy, wind them and most importantly actually check on them. She didn’t do any of this in all that time!

Edited, as I didn't read the article properly the first time.

I disagree that this has been reported for the public to learn from - and I would hope that it was obvious not to drink a bottle of vodka whilst you are caring for a baby. I'd suggest that you look at other sources, where you will find an abundance of information on what to look for, rather than a news article.

The BBC piece was written from a police press release which, while helpful for providing information about the outcome of the case, does not in any way replicate decent court reporting. Unfortunately many local media outlets no longer send reporters to court due to the high financial cost of doing so.

Thankfully the local paper here did send a reporter to court. Their report is here which states that the cause of death is unknown.

https://www.stokesentinel.co.uk/news/stoke-on-trent-news/stoke-trent-baby-lay-dead-10508271.amp

There will be an inquest at which the coroner will explore in more depth the reasons for the baby’s death.

Court reporting is not designed to provide advice to parents, and it would be irresponsible for court reporters to do so, unless its advice specifically offered by experts in or outside of the courtroom.

The baby was left on the sofa. A healthy baby could roll and suffocate on a cushion, could roll off the sofa, and this particular baby was left overnight on the sofa. That's 12 hours, a baby could develop any kind of health condition in that time. In the past my children when babies have needed immediate attention due to projectile vomiting whilst laying on their backs and febrile seizures. It could literally have been anything. The important takeaway is that babies, even healthy ones shouldn't be left unsupervised for all that time. It is utterly abhorrent that this happened to that poor baby.

I'm curious why you are so fixated on the 'what' happened. You mentioned having a young baby yourself. Are you worried from a health anxiety point of view or a 'I've been leaving my baby in another room' point of view?

There’s a lot of defending her on Facebook which is unusual in a baby death case as people usually massively distance themselves but she has a lot of support from people saying she was a good, loving mum who had drinks with her friend whilst her baby slept and baby died of SIDS. Tragic outcome all round.

I don’t think it’s curiosity, but fear.

Who knows OP, but the fact you’re worrying about signs to watch out for means you’re going to be checking regularly.

This is a very unlikely scenario to happen.

https://www.cps.gov.uk/west-midlands/news/mother-convicted-child-cruelty-after-getting-drunk-vodka

I kind of get what you’re saying too OP and there are other articles online which she’s a little more light on the specifics of the offence like this from the CPS which talks about Mum not checking on her baby properly during the night (only checking from a doorway) and presumably being too drunk/hungover to notice baby didn’t wake for their usual feed between 4.30 and 6.30am and only realising this at 9am by which time baby had been dead for a while.

I suspect there’s more to this one than is being shared and that this was even further away from it being a case of a “responsible mum having drinks with her friend whilst her healthy baby was put to sleep appropriately” than it reads.

As pp have said a sofa is the worst place to leave a small baby to sleep for suffocation risk. The baby should be in the same room as the parent until 6 months old. A mother who isn’t inebriated will be checking on her child regularly as instinct not leaving them for 12+ hours. It isn’t illegal to drink with children in the house but in my four years of being a parent I don’t think I have ever been drunk in charge of my children.

https://www.lullabytrust.org.uk/baby-safety/safer-sleep-information/safer-sleep-overview/

I think this is probably what the police suspected (that the baby got into breathing difficulties because of being on the sofa) but couldn't prove.

Absolutely harrowing case. The mother and baby have both paid a terrible price here.

https://www.lullabytrust.org.uk/baby-safety/infection-and-illness/baby-check-app/

She put her to sleep on a sofa and left her for 14 hours. She probably suffocated, which is a strong risk when a small baby sleeps on a sofa.

Have you tried googling the mother's name to see if there are other reports? I have, and they make clear that this five month old baby was left sleeping largely unattended on a sofa in a separate room to her mother for about 12 hours. That's not safe for a baby. I would imagine that they are not able to prove that being left on the sofa alone for hours as opposed to being placed safely in a cot caused the baby's death. But it seems like a very clear case of neglect to me, I'm afraid.

Yes, very unfair actually.
Also have to wonder…….did the mother smoke and drink to such excess during her pregnancy which would no doubt have harmed the unborn child anyway??

Unless you are in the habit of excessively drinking and smoking while caring for a very young baby, I don't think that a newspaper article is where you will learn how to mitigate the risk factors for preventable baby deaths. She's been charged with child cruelty, not manslaughter, because her treatment of her baby was cruel and neglecttful.

Your GP or Health Visitor should be able to provide you with information about how you reduce the risk of SIDS.

My advice to you as a new parent would be don’t get drunk when in charge of your baby, don’t smoke so you have second hand smoke on your clothes and in your hair, and check your baby regularly. That is all you need OP.

Some of us are a bit bewildered by op’s question as her op also details her confusion about what the mum did wrong by drinking and smoking, when the article makes it extremely clear what happened and why this was a problem, as if it’s not bleeding obvious that you shouldn’t get tanked off your arse when looking after a baby.

Yes, it feels a little unfair to call the article "irresponsible and unhelpful." The purpose of a news article is not to teach people life skills. It's to share news which this article did.

In every single clinic you go to with a new baby there are posters advising about safe sleep with a baby ie back to sleep, avoid co sleeping, paticularly under the influence of alcohol. ,babies should be in a cot in a well ventilated room
Health visitors advise parents give out leaflets etc .

The article is based on the trial of the mother, not the outcome of the coroners verdict at the inquest following the baby’s post mortem.

I agree with you.
And I don't think the OP is unreasonable to ask this question.

Healthy babies can and do die in 14/15 hours if left in an unsafe place and not checked on.

Baby was placed on a sofa, so quite possibly sudden infant death syndrome/cot death due to an unsafe sleeping position? Either baby has turned a bit to the side and got its face squished up against the back of the sofa and suffocated, or baby has been in a slightly crunched up position rather than being flat and its airway was occluded.

However in another article I read it said the pathologist could not establish cause of death, so it’s all very much conjecture. And that’s why the bbc article doesn’t have more information they just don’t know.