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Wahakura (Māori woven flax bassinet) programme

Also: wahakura

Māori-led response to the 'stop bedsharing' message: a woven flax bassinet that sits in the adult bed so babies can sleep close by on their own surface, aimed at infants exposed to smoking in pregnancy. Weaving wānanga, antenatal engagement and safe sleep education go with the device; DHBs later funded distribution.

Years
2005–now
Country
New Zealand
Topic
Infant sleep
Asks people to
Substitute
Strategy
Cultural tailoringEnvironmental supportTrusted messenger
Channel
Clinical settingInterpersonal
Audience
Parents
Māori whānau with infants at high SUDI risk

Evidence

ExperimentalPositive

RCT of 200 mainly Māori mothers: wahakura vs bassinet showed no more head covering, prone/side sleep or direct bed sharing (7% vs 12% at 1 month), no physiological differences, and twice the full breastfeeding at 6 months (22.5% vs 10.7%). NZ infant mortality fell 29% in 2009-15, mostly among Māori, alongside sleep-space programmes (ecological claim by programme founders).

Sponsor (who paid)

  • Māori health practitioners and weavers (David Tipene-Leach and others) NGO
  • District Health Boards Foreign government

Credits (who made it)

Not recorded yet.

Related campaigns

Sources

  1. Baddock SA et al. Wahakura versus bassinet for safe infant sleep: a randomized trial. Pediatrics 2017 evaluation · 2017 · DOI 10.1542/peds.2016-0162 · PMID 28044049
  2. Baddock SA et al. Physiological stability in an indigenous sleep device: RCT. Arch Dis Child 2017 evaluation · 2017 · DOI 10.1136/archdischild-2017-313512 · PMID 29030386
  3. Tipene-Leach D, Abel S. The wahakura as an Indigenous vision for a safe sleep environment. Aust J Prim Health 2019 evaluation · 2019 · DOI 10.1071/PY19033 · PMID 31513759
  4. Abel S et al. The wahakura: qualitative study. N Z Med J 2015 evaluation · 2015 · PMID 26101114
  5. Abel S, Tipene-Leach D. SUDI prevention: review of Māori safe sleep innovations. N Z Med J 2013 reference · 2013 · PMID 24045355

Research notes

Created 2026-10-23 from the sleep campaign literature search (PubMed and web search; OpenAlex was unreachable), see docs/sleep-campaigns-literature.md. Findings are paraphrased from abstracts, not full texts; official URLs come from search results and were not opened. Start year 2005 per Tipene-Leach & Abel 2019; Abel 2013 says 2006. Strategy 'cultural-tailoring' is not yet in the taxonomy; propose or map. Trial registration ACTRN12610000993099.

Record cases/nz-wahakura.json, updated 2026-10-23· Link to this campaign