Letters: Briefly

l CONGRATULATIONS on the excellent Drugs World War series, especially the discussion of the implications for the relief of pain by the use of opioids like diamorphine (pharmaceutical heroin) in terminal illness. Paradoxically it is the strongly anti-voluntary-euthanasia hospices, often with a Christian ethos, that are willing, where appropriate, to use them on the largest scale.

Don Aston

Solihull

l I DO see the joke ("Never lie your baby on his front, on his back - or on his side", Real Life, 1 February), but how's this for laughs: around 20 studies worldwide have shown that babies are up to 12 times more likely to die if they sleep on their fronts than if they sleep on their backs. And no study has shown the opposite.

Joyce Epstein

Foundation for the Study of Infant Deaths

London SW1