17 kids known to Montana child welfare system died in 2019

HELENA, Mont. (AP) — For the second straight year, the Montana child welfare system said it could help prevent the deaths of children with public campaigns urging people to report child abuse and educating people about safe sleeping practices for infants.

Seventeen children who were known to the Montana child welfare system died in 2019, the Department of Public Health and Human Services said Wednesday.

The Division of Child and Family Services said five children died due to unsafe sleeping conditions, four died of medical conditions and three died due to abuse or neglect. Other causes of death were drowning, a car accident, sudden infant death syndrome, and a firearm. The cause of one death was undetermined.

Thirteen were in the care of their parents when they died, two were with foster parents, one was with a grandparent and one with a babysitter, the report said. Criminal charges were filed in six cases and a decision is pending in two more.

The 2019 data also shows another seven deaths among children who had not been the subject of a report to the child abuse hotline until after they died. Two of them drowned, two died of abuse and neglect, one died due to unsafe sleep, one choked and the cause of the other death was undetermined. Criminal charges were filed in one case.

The health department is running public service announcements to urge people to report child abuse and neglect to the state hotline, in part due to unreported abuse in the seven deaths and due to a decrease in reports after schools closed to prevent the spread of the coronavirus. The agency is also promoting safe sleeping, which means having a baby sleep on their back, by themselves, with no other items in their crib.

The agency continues to provide education and support for young families through its First Years Initiative, which began in 2018, and has partnered with Healthy Mothers, Healthy Babies to provide 1,500 cribs to families during that time.

The agency is also teaming up with the Department of Fish, Wildlife and Parks to provide more than 300 children’s life jackets to loaner stations at Montana waterways to prevent drownings and will be running public service announcements about safety around water and learning CPR, the report said.

“We at DPHHS continue to build and support our community partnerships as we all work to prevent child abuse and neglect in our communities,” Hogan said in a statement.