One-month-old Shaniyla N. Malone died Monday while co-sleeping with her mother.
From the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel:
A 1-month-old girl died early Monday while sleeping with her mother and two siblings in a full-size bed in their Milwaukee home, according to a medical examiner's report released Monday.
Shaniyla N. Malone was unresponsive when her mother, Sheila Malone, 24, awakened at 4:12 a.m., about three hours after the mother, baby and two other children, ages 3 and 4, went to bed in the 3800 block of W. Hampton Ave., the report says.
Malone's death is at least the eighth co-sleeping infant death in Milwaukee County this year, according to a Journal Sentinel count based on medical examiner's reports.
According to the medical examiner's report on Shaniyla N. Malone's death:
The family had a normal day Sunday, including an outing to the lakefront. Sheila Malone gave the baby a bottle about midnight, and they went to bed around 1 a.m., with the mother in the middle, the two older children closest to the wall - on opposite ends of the bed - and the baby on her back on an adult pillow on the outer side of the mattress.
Malone told authorities she spontaneously awoke at 4:12 a.m. Monday, because she had fallen asleep with her pants on, and wanted to take them off. She got out of bed, removed her pants and noticed that the baby, still on the adult pillow, appeared blue. Nothing was covering the baby's face, and she was not lying on top of the comforter, the mother told investigators.
When she realized Shaniyla wasn't breathing, Malone began to scream, picked up the baby, and ran to another bedroom where Malone's brother and his girlfriend were sleeping. They called 911, and the dispatcher coached Malone on how to perform CPR, which she did until rescue workers arrived. There was no sign of trauma, according to the report.
Malone told investigators she didn't wake up on top of the baby and "did not feel she overlaid on the infant." The full-size bed was covered by a comforter. The mattress was soft and uneven, and the box spring was propped up on several milk crates.
It was Malone's practice to sleep with her babies, she told authorities. Her fourth child was not at home when the baby died.
Malone told authorities she was on maternity leave from a day care center and did not own a crib.
This is so tragic.
Shaniyla had "no apparent health complications" after being born by cesarean section on April 9.
I don't understand why this mother of four, a day care center worker, wouldn't provide her own infant with a safe sleeping environment.
An infant shouldn't be sleeping on a surface like an adult pillow. The risk of suffocation is too great.
The article says nothing about the mother's condition, such as whether she had consumed alcohol or drugs before going to sleep. We only know she feel asleep with her pants on.
Did the baby girl have a health problem that caused her death, or was it directly due to the unsafe sleeping environment? At this point, that's unknown.
The baby's death is terribly sad, whatever the circumstances.
If Shaniyla died due to her mother's negligence, I think she should be held accountable for the death.
Maybe if adults faced a penalty for their irresponsibility in co-sleeping with infants they wouldn't do it.
Co-sleeping deaths aren't accidents. They're 100 percent preventable.
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