Health Services Agency

About SIDS

• Proposed New Definition: the sudden unexpected death of an infant under 1 year of age, with onset of the fatal episode apparently occurring during sleep, that remains unexplained after a thorough investigation, including performance of a complete autopsy and review of the circumstances of death and the clinical history.
• Sudden Infant Death Syndrome – SIDS – in the past has been called “crib death”.
• SIDS cannot be prevented or predicted.
• No one knows what causes SIDS.
• SIDS is not suffocation, choking, spitting up, vomiting or child abuse.
• SIDS can occur at any time of the day in a baby who seems to be in good health.
• It usually happens when he/she is asleep.
• Death occurs quickly without warning.
• Babies who die of SIDS don’t suffer.
• There is no test to identify which infants will die from it.
• The diagnosis is made after completion of the case history, death scene investigation and autopsy. Only when all other possible causes of death are eliminated, can the SIDS diagnosis be given.