Today I read an incredibly tragic story about a 2-month-old baby in Pennsylvania who died of sudden infant death syndrome (SIDS) because her parents were allegedly too drunk and high on cocaine to notice.

The parents, Jennifer Nicole Gaster and Daniel Keith Martin II, both 30, stood trial Monday on child endangerment charges alleging that after a night spent snorting cocaine and drinking beer and vodka, the couple was too incapacitated to notice their baby was dying.

This is not the first time we have seen a parents with a history of drug and/or alcohol abuse lose a child to SIDS. In February of 2007, a Michigan woman pleaded guilty to charges that claimed high levels of cocaine in her breast milk had killed her 5-month-old daughter. Although the cause of death was originally thought to be SIDS at the time the baby died, further testing proved otherwise, and at the trial, the mother admitted to using cocaine two or three times the day before the baby died.

Traces of cocaine can remain in breast milk for more than 48 hours after a woman uses it — and the transmission from mother to infant has been linked to respiratory failure, seizures, increased cardiovascular risk, central nervous system damage, irritability and addiction — just to name a few.

Babies are at high risk for SIDS if they:

o          Are born to mothers who smoke or use drugs

o          Have low birth weight or premature infants

o          Are exposed to environmental tobacco smoke

o          Sleep in a crib packed with soft objects and loose bedding

o          Are placed to sleep on their stomachs

o          Are between the ages of 1 and 6 months

Please be advised that most drugs are transmitted through breast milk. If you are abusing any kind of drug – especially cocaine – the effects can be deadly.

There has been a lot of confusion about what may have happened to kill Jett Travolta, the only son of John Travolta, so suddenly at only 16 years old. This confusion is not surprising. It happens every time that we the public mix with what is essentially a private matter. Prurient public curiosity aside, somewhere in here may be a message about the need for compliance with seizure medication, a particular problem among adolescents, where medications are about 66 percent effective. There have been some reports that Jett’s medication may have been stopped because it wasn’t working. It is not yet clear whether the parents’ belief in scientology kept them from seeking other treatments, or whether that would have made a difference in controlling Jett’s seizures.

For what it’s worth, here is my take on Jett Travolta’s tragic death:

1. It is unlikely that Kawasaki’s disease (an inflammatory disease of blood vessels that also causes fever, lymph node swelling, and rashes) played a direct role in Jett Travolta’s tragic death. Though this rare disease (4,000 cases per year) can affect the heart, and also cause seizures, it is also generally cured or in remission by age 5.
2. It has never been confirmed that Jett Travolta suffers from autism, an illness which is characterized by difficulty relating to others. Autism does not cause seizures, though the incidence of seizures is 4-32 percent in autism and only 0.5 percent in the general population.
3. Patients with epilepsy have a mortality rate 2-3 times that of the general population. Epilepsy-related causes of death in this population account for 40 percent of the deaths.
4. Death from epilepsy frequently involves problems with breathing due to obstruction of the airways, buildup of fluid in the lungs (pulmonary edema), or a cardiac arrhythmia resulting from a surge of hormones that accompanies a seizure. (the autopsy would not show an arrhythmia but would show damage to the heart or a problem with the lungs)
5. Sudden, unexplained death in epilepsy accounts for 8-17 percent of these deaths.
6. But in Jett Travolta’s case, news reports would suggest that the most likely causes of death would be trauma-related (hitting his head on the bathtub during the seizure, or drowning). If a blow to the head caused bleeding in the brain, the autopsy will show that.

Dr. Marc Siegel is an internist and associate professor of medicine at the NYU School of Medicine. He is a FOX News medical contributor and writes a health column for LA Times, where he examines TV and movies for medical accuracy. Dr. Siegel is the author of “False Alarm: The Truth about the Epidemic of Fear“ and “Bird Flu: Everything You Need to Know About the Next Pandemic.”  Read more at www.doctorsiegel.com

A 6-year-old Texas girl is recovering after she had surgery Wednesday to remove the right side of her brain, WFAA-TV reported.

Jessie Hall, who lives in Aledo, Texas, has Rasmussen’s encephalitis, a rare illness that eats away at the brain and causes seizures and reduced mobility. In Jessie’s case, she lost the use of her left arm.

Doctors hope that removing the diseased part of Jessie’s brain will stop the uncontrollable seizures.

Pfizer Inc.’s once promising anti-smoking drug Chantix received another blow Wednesday after a nonprofit group’s report about serious physical side effects prompted the Federal Aviation Administration to ban the drug’s use by pilots and air traffic controllers.

The report, from the Institute for Safe Medication Practices, points out hundreds of serious problems reported since the popular drug was approved in May 2006, including vision and heart problems, dizziness, loss of consciousness, seizures, and abnormal spasms and movements.