Infant suffocation: Baby dies while drinking milk

Find out more about this case of infant suffocation, as well as 5 tips to make sure your baby is safe

It certainly isn’t the first time we’ve heard about newborns dying from unsuspecting agents.

Horrific news like this pops out ever so often in the news and as parents, a nightmare like this actually happening, is a hard pill to swallow.

Learn more about how this baby girl died while drinking milk

Unsuspecting deaths

There have been numerous news reports of babies dying from things that parents would never have suspected, such as toxic contents from food products, malicious babysitters or domestic helpers, infant suffocation and so forth.

No matter how careful a parent can be, these unfortunate events do happen and plenty of times, they are almost impossible to avoid. A child’s death is definitely a parent’s worst nightmare. What happened to this baby girl was one such unforeseen circumstance of infant suffocation.

Not a case of milk poisoning, but negligence.

Infant suffocation

This incident that happened in Malaysia is not another case of babies dying from poison milk. Instead, it really has nothing to do with the milk. What actually caused the death of this baby was negligence—a babysitter’s negligence.

Asiaone reported of a five-month-old baby girl by the name of Cyndi Koay Xin Lin who died while drinking milk at a babysitter’s house in Bukit Mertajam, Penang on a Monday morning.

When the babysitter discovered Cyndi’s face turning blue, she immediately attempted performing cardiopulmonary resuscitation on the baby girl—but to no avail. She then contacted Cyndi’s parents, who rushed their daughter to a clinic.

Devastated parents

Doctors could not revive the baby girl since she had stopped breathing for quite a while. Cyndi’s mother came to the Bukit Mertajam Hospital with her younger sister, and joined her husband and some relatives who were already waiting there.

The devastated couple held each other after seeing their daughter’s body in the mortuary. It is clear that the baby girl had been died of infant suffocation but Penang Chief Criminal Investigation Department chief Senior Assistant Commissioner Mazlan Kesah said that the police have yet to confirm the cause of death.

The Koay family

Cyndi was a twin girl in the Koay family. According to Asiaone, Mr Koay and his wife had been married for 10 years before they opted for in vitro fertilisation, which resulted in their having twins.

Read these tips on how to prevent infant suffocation.

How to prevent infant suffocation

Do not leave your newborn infant with a milk bottle in the first place!
Never feed your newborn infant while placing him or her on flat surfaces. This position allows them to be susceptible to choking and thus suffocation.
Avoid having too many soft surfaces for your infant. Remove extra pillows, bolsters, stuffed toys and blankets that may increase the risks of infant suffocation. If you practice co-sleeping, it is best to get a co-sleeper that your baby will fit snugly in. A co-sleeper will prevent your baby from rolling off the bed or being stuffed under pillows and blankets.
Do not leave plastic bags or wraps around. You may think this is not something to worry about but plastic bags and wraps have a knack of flying around or somehow landing in random places in your home.
Avoid choking hazards, small toys, or even bigger bits of food after you start weaning off your baby.

For more on how to prevent suffocation, watch this video:

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Written by

Brenda Loo

infant suffocation