12,000 families in NYC need a crib for their babies to sleep safely
Cribs for Kids
In New York City many advances have been made in reducing some of the risks and barriers to good health for mothers and babies. However, in many NYC neighborhoods, babies are dying because of unsafe sleeping situations. Although the number of Sudden Infant Death Syndrome (SIDS) deaths has fallen dramatically in NYC, in the past 5 years, 60% of unintentional injury deaths were due to suffocation, and over half of those deaths were due to an unsafe sleep environment-either sharing a bed with an adult and/or child, sleeping on a couch or soft bedding. Babies that are most often affected by suffocation are born to low-income families who cannot afford to protect their infants because they do not have access to a safe crib.
These alarming statistics led the NYC Health Department to become a partner of the national Cribs for Kids program in 2007, which provides safe sleep education and a portable crib to high risk families who don't have a safe space for babies to sleep. Since 2007, the NYC Cribs for Kids program has distributed over 4,000 cribs and provided over 20,000 families with safe sleep education. Despite this success, the NYC Health Department has only been able to scratch the surface of the families in need of safe sleep education and a crib. The Fund for Public Health in New York is raising funds to buy cribs for families in need. Please consider making a donation of a crib to a family in need. Donate now.
The New York City Cribs for Kids program provides high-risk families with a portable crib and safe sleep education. The program has distributed over 4,000 cribs since 2007. Martine Hackett is the Deputy Director of the Office of the Medical Director at the NYC Health Department's Bureau of Maternal, Infant and Reproductive Health. Martine describes the NYC Cribs for Kids program in this video.
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