Charles West

Hypoxic responses in infants: Subjecting infants to low oxygen concentrations seems unethical

Editor—The ethics of Parkins et al’s study depend partly on whether there is any potential benefit to the infants from the experiment.1 If parents subject their infant to low oxygen concentrations in an aeroplane they take a risk which is balanced against the benefit of air travel. Unless there is some real prospect of identifying infants at risk and offering useful protection against the sudden infant death syndrome, it seems to me to be unethical to subject those infants to the risk of exposure to low oxygen concentration. The fact that some of the families had previously experinced the loss of a child may have increased the likelihood of compliance. This makes me even more worried about the ethics of the study.