WELCOMED: Rona McCandlish chaired the Nice guideline.

A DAILY Echo campaign to raise awareness of the dangers of sleeping with your baby has been backed by the woman charged with drawing up national guidelines for post-natal care.

Professor Rona McCandlish was full of praise for the Keep Them Safe campaign championed by the Daily Echo.

She chaired the group looking into post-natal care for the National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence (NICE) the body that sets national guidelines for the NHS to follow.

Guidelines published today by NICE warn of the dangers of parents sleeping with their babies, and doctors, midwives and health care practitioners will be urged to follow the new advice.

Commenting on the campaign, Professor McCandlish said: "I was interested while developing this guidance to see the Daily Echo had picked up on this issue of co-sleeping.

"We are delighted that we are now able to add even further weight to the work the Daily Echo has done to help parents.

"The Daily Echo has led the way in Hampshire and the Isle of Wight."

Today's guidelines from NICE advise parents never to sleep on a sofa or armchair with their baby.

If mums and dads choose to share a bed with their baby, it reminds them there is an increased risk of sudden infant death if either parent is a smoker, has recently drunk any alcohol, has taken medication or drugs that make them sleep more heavily or is very tired.

Professor McCandlish said: "Co-sleeping is not advisable.

"Babies can't wake you up and say you've rolled on me by accident'."

Keep Them Safe posters have gone up in hospitals, community centres, doctors' surgeries and play schemes throughout the city.

The campaign was backed by Southampton City Primary Care Trust, the Foundation for the Study of Infant Deaths (FSID), Hampshire police and Southampton University Hospitals NHS Trust.

More than 300 babies die suddenly and inexplicably in the UK each year, according to FSID experts, and it says the safest place for a baby to sleep is in a cot in your room for the first six months.

12:17pm Wednesday 26th July 2006

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