Infant Safe Sleep
The Maryland Department of Health (MDH) has been working with partners to increase messaging on Infant Safe Sleep to provide information and resources to families. The following information and resources are provided to support families with infants.
Background
Every year in the United States, around 3,500 infants die of sleep-related causes, including sudden infant death syndrome (SIDS), ill-defined deaths, and accidental suffocation and strangulation in bed, as reported by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). In Maryland, infant death attributed to Sudden Infant Death Syndrome (SIDS) had generally declined from 64 in 2015 to a low of 38 in 2019. SIDS deaths increased in 2020 to 45, which is an 18% increase since 2019. According to the American Academy of Pediatrics, SIDS remains the leading cause of post neonatal mortality. Recently, we have seen a significant increase in sleep-related and sudden deaths in infants across the state.
