Healthy four-month-old baby 'likely' suffocated to death after being left alone on play mat

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A four-month-old baby boy tragically died after he was left to sleep alone on a toy mat in his bedroom, an inquest has been told. Leonidas Ramsden, born on Christmas Day 2021, passed away at his family home in Buckfastleigh, Devon, in April last year.

The inquest, held in Exeter, heard that the toy mat had a safety warning against leaving babies and toddlers unsupervised on it.

On the night before his death, Leonidas had been breastfed and then placed on his back on the mat, which lay atop his parents' mattress on their bedroom floor. His mother, 21 year old Chloe, feeling unwell, fell asleep on the sofa and asked the baby's father, 29 year old Dudley, to later transfer him to his regular Moses basket.

Dudley checked on Leonidas at around 3am and decided not to move him. Both parents ended up falling asleep on the sofa, and when Chloe woke at 6am, she found her son face down and unresponsive on the mat.

Chloe explained to the hearing, "It was like a play mat but I just used it as extra comfort while feeding. I knew it was not a safe sleeping scenario and I never left him unattended in it," reports the Mirror.

Despite the post-mortem examination, the cause of death could not be determined, although the pathologist did not rule out sudden unexplained death in infancy (SUDI).

Det Con Donna Tullock expressed concerns about the safety of the equipment, revealing: "We were told it was a sleeping pod but it appeared more like the underneath of a play mat and it did have a warning label on it reading 'never leave a child under three unattended while using this toy', so it was not an official sleeping pod."

Alison Longhorn, Area coroner for Devon, determined the tragic circumstances of the loss, stating: "Leonidas died having been found in a face down sleeping position while sleeping on a mat. It is likely this position restricted his ability to breathe freely and he was asphyxiated."

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