SIDS Awareness and the Internet make a Winning Team! Top 5% Recognition Awarded to the New SIDS Information World Wide Web Site This wonderful source of information can be found at: http://sids-network.org The Sudden Infant Death Syndrome (SIDS) Information Home page has been rated among the top 5% of all sites on the Internet by Point Survey. Point is a free service which rates and reviews only the best sites on the World Wide Web. They provide surfers with a standard of excellence: a catalog of the most lively, useful, and fun sites on the Net. Their Top Ten list has been featured on CNN and in many publications, and Point Survey ratings are provided to media around the world. Their ratings are based solely on merit as judged by their users and reviewers. They score in each of three categories: - Content: Just how broad, deep, and amazingly thorough is the information? Are there good links? Good clips? Is it accurate? Complete? Up-to-date? - Presentation: Is the page beautiful? Colorful? Easy to use? Does it lead visitors through the information nicely? Does it use video, audio, and original graphics? Does it break new ground? - Experience: This is the key rating. Is this fun? Is it worth the time? Will we recommend it to friends? All things considered, does this site deliver the goods? Why is this recognition important? SIDS is the leading cause of death of infants between the ages of one month and one year. Every hour of every day, an infant becomes a victim of SIDS in the United States alone! Many more children die of SIDS in a year than all who die of cancer, heart disease, pneumonia, child abuse, AIDS, cystic fibrosis and muscular dystrophy combined. Yet SIDS research gets a mere fraction of the money spent on other infant diseases. We cannot stop finding answers to those other diseases, but SIDS research needs to be placed at the top of the list. When we can get to the day when SIDS awareness is as popular as that for cancer and AIDS, then society can provide researchers with serious research money. Researchers are the key. They need to unravel this horrible mystery we call SIDS. How does the SIDS Information Web Site Help? The SIDS Information Web Site helps in several ways. It ties together the smattering of existing SIDS information on the Internet. It provides information not previously available on the Internet ... research progress, support information, contacts throughout the world, educational information about risk factors, news of SIDS awareness activities, stories from those directly affected by the tragedy of SIDS ... the list goes on. This information is available to the 30 plus million Internet users world wide! Is it working? YES! SIDS families are getting immediate support, researchers are contributing updates on their research, the general public is learning about this terrible disease. This Web Site has been viewed by thousands of people from all over the world. This Site is helping to focus people's needs to do something. Currently, volunteers are developing a Listserver (an electronic form of Bulletin Board Service for anyone using the Internet) for SIDS issues, pulling together a listing of contacts (people willing to provide support, and organizations) throughout Europe and North America, translating some basic SIDS information into other languages for the SIDS Web Site, etc. Visit this page as soon as you can to see what is available. We encourage honest, constructive feedback to make this area as useful as possible. Please e-mail any articles, suggestions, ideas, and comments to sidsnet1@sids-network.org. The Sudden Infant Death Syndrome (SIDS) Information Home Page on the World Wide Web was produced, and will be maintained by volunteers of the SIDS Network, Inc., an all volunteer, non- profit SIDS full service provider. The SIDS Network headquarters is located in Ledyard, Connecticut. Thanks! Chuck Mihalko, President September 1995 SIDS Network 9 Gonch Farm Road Ledyard, Connecticut 06339 USA email: sidsnet1@sids-network.org Web Site: http://sids-network.org 800-560-1454 - voice 860-887-7309 - fax