Early Infant Death Linked to Parent’s Death
Early infant death study. A new study has been published Thursday linking the connection between parents dying prematurely because of losing a baby in the first year of the child. The British study has used random samples from national death registrations between the years 1971 to 2006. They have made a thorough comparison between deaths of parents who lost a baby in the child's first year or those yet to be born against parents dying after losing a baby beyond their first year.
Grieving parents are more likely to die. Using historic data, they are 2 to 4 times having more risk of dying or becoming widowed 10 years after the child's death as compared to parents who did not suffer the same incident. Among parents, mothers are more at higher risk.
In England and Wales, bereaved mothers are 4 times more likely to die prematurely. While in Scotland, Scottish moms are 6 times more likely to die after experiencing a traumatic death of a child at first year. However, the study showed slight positive results as the risk among mothers lessened but still significantly higher at 50% after a quarter decade (25 years) and only 20% higher after 35 years.
The data given was not clear and did not give further details thus the mortality reasons among parents are yet to be specified. There are few speculations stating that suicide and alcohol abuse may have cause the untimely deaths among grieving parents.