The trustworthiness of this particular site notwithstanding, this little bit of info's been around for perhaps a year now.

It's harder to cause "shaken baby syndrome" than most people, including most pediatricians, think.

This doesn't mean that the brain damage isn't real. It just means that the shaking that gets the blame isn't the cause. In some cases there's illness or some other trauma that occurred hours or days or weeks before the syndromes were noticed--but the shaking had been noticed shortly before the symptoms were first noticed and therefore, by classic post-hoc reasoning, the shaking was viewed as the only possible cause.

in many cases the shaking triggered an examination that led to identifying the problem.

It also doesn't mean that the shaking isn't harmless. Brain and neck trauma aren't the only things to worry about, after all. It's just that the claim is narrow while all the counter-objections include broader concerns.

Canuckistanian

(42,290 posts)

7. I heard the CBC Radio show about this yesterday

Reply to Swede (Original post)

Sat Jan 14, 2012, 12:12 AM

Jan 2012

Quite damning. It turns out that there are a LOT of people who have been convicted of deaths caused by "shaken baby syndrome" - and they may be innocent.

Here's a link where you can get the audio:

http://www.cbc.ca/thecurrent/episode/2012/01/13/has-shaken-baby-syndrome-been-overblown/

Poll_Blind

(23,864 posts)

8. Really? A football player? Only 12% of the force required to cause bleeding on the brain of a BABY?

Reply to Swede (Original post)

Sat Jan 14, 2012, 12:14 AM

Jan 2012

Type this into Google search: "football player" AND "bleeding on the brain"

If other football players are giving each other similar injuries, how exactly would a football player not be able to induce such injuries in a simulated baby?

This story is...odd. Uses the words hoax and fraud. Why...exactly does Mr. Holcomb feel they need to use those specific words? Those are some damned loaded words and don't sound particularly scholarly.

Frankly, in some hypothetical experiment I would wager that a teenager of average strength could easily shake a baby till the point where its neck snapped, much less provide the forces required in order to cause a brain injury.

Hell, in a similar hypothetical experiment I would also wager than a regular adult female, if given the same "as long and as hard as you can" test with an adult male could also cause a similar brain injury in an adult male who was not resisting.

There are a bunch of things about this that just don't add up.

PB

bemildred

(90,061 posts)

9. Does sound like horseshit.

Reply to Poll_Blind (Reply #8)

Sat Jan 14, 2012, 01:26 AM

Jan 2012

Soemthing is not right there, or something is being left out.

Igel

(35,293 posts)

15. A lot of things don't add up.

Reply to Poll_Blind (Reply #8)

Sun Jan 15, 2012, 11:40 PM

Jan 2012

Don't know about the exact numbers, but this has been a dirty little secret for a while.

A football player can produce enough force to smash open a kid's skull. Problem is that he can't do it by simple shaking. Ram a football player into a wall and you have a rather abrupt end to his body's velocity, and a lot of the force needed to slow the body is absorbed by the head.

Shake a baby and the change in momentum is a lot slower and the neck absorbs the momentum. Big difference in the physics.

Not sure about the difference in linear versus angular momentum here--the football player's impact would be nearly 100% linear, running into the wall. Shaking a kid would involve having his head rotate, so some of the momentum would result in torsion within the brain.

Still, the "shaken-baby syndrome" problem's been blown out of proportion. It was a trendy accusation against the most helpless of us--and if we can help the helpless, that's good. Anything that then defends against those hurting the helpless, even if it's to show that they're not actually hurting the helpless, is a bad thing; in this case it reduces our usefulness in defending the helpless. Yes, in some cases it really is all about us.