Doctors make SIDS breakthrough

Doctors at the Adelaide Women's and Children hospital believe they may have found one cause of Sudden Infant Death Syndrome (SIDS).

Over the past decade, improved education has resulted in an 80 per cent decrease in the annual SIDS death rate to about 130 children last year.

But Dr Paul Goldwater says bacteria known as curlin proteins have been found in high rates in all children involved in the research, who have died of SIDS.

He says the protein can occur naturally in the body and result in a septic shock reaction in children.

"It would probably be derived from bacteria in their bodies, probably somewhere in their gut, presumably through their gut wall," he said.

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