SAN ANTONIO — A newly formed non-profit, Baby Education for South Texas or B.E.S.T., is a collaboration of doctors, health care professionals, and community members coming together to help prevent child deaths due to shared sleeping, or co-sleeping.
“This is really an issue that we can solve, we can take care of this,” said Bexar County Medical Examiner Dr. William McClain.
President of the non-profit and Mednax Neonatologist, Dr. Sanjie Garza-Cox, says she and her colleagues have noticed a rising trend when it comes to sudden unexpected infant deaths.
“We decided to do something that has not been done in San Antonio before,” added Dr. Garza-Cox.
Bexar County Medical Examiner Dr. William McClain sees the tragedies first hand, and the effects on the families.
“Every single one of them told me that they didn’t think it was gonna happen to them,” McClain went on to say.
Right now B.E.S.T is all about creating education and awareness, and trying to come up with ways to prevent children from dying due to co-sleeping.
“Maybe hundreds of babies tonight will go to bed next to Mom and Dad, siblings, an adult in a bed, or on a couch and you just pray to God they’ll make it through tonight,” said McClain.
B.E.S.T is looking for all kinds of people to join the cause, including churches and community organizations.
If you’d like to help, you can contact the non-profit by sending an email to the following:
info@best4baby.org or sgarzacox@best4baby.org