There is now more reason than ever to link common bacteria to sudden infant death syndrome (SIDS) or cot death.
The link was proposed decades ago, but evidence was scarce. Now researchers from the Great Ormond Street Hospital for Children in London, who trawled through the results of about 500 autopsies, have shown that Staphylococcus aureus and Escherichia coli are more prevalent in SIDS babies than in those whose cause of death was known (The Lancet, vol 371, p 1848).
Bacteria are unlikely to be solely to blame, but the body’s immune response to bacterial toxins may help explain…
