RICH countries could learn a lesson about caring for low-birthweight babies from poorer countries, say doctors in Colombia. Letting parents keep these babies warm is at least as good as using incubators, and encourages breastfeeding and bonding, they argue.
Worldwide, 20 million babies weighing under 2 kilograms are born each year. Many are premature and unable to regulate their body heat properly, and so are usually put in incubators. But in 1978, overcrowded wards forced a Colombian doctor, Edgar Rey, to invent “kangaroo care”. The baby, wearing a nappy and bonnet, is kept next to the mother or father’s bare…
