Editorial
Lucy Mecklenburgh is facing a backlash after ‘kissing her baby on the lips’ in a photo.
The reality star took to Instagram on June 3 and shared a snap of her cradling her newborn daughter, who is yet to be named.
She simply captioned the post: “My dream girl.”
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Although the post has accumulated over 189,000 likes from Mecklenburgh’s followers, some people have taken to the comments and said it’s ‘not safe’ to kiss a baby on the lips.
In response to the snap, one said: “Lucy please don’t kiss a new baby on the lips. Google it.”
“You can be an HSV carrier with no symptoms. The risk is small and it’s totally the parents’ decision but since my dad, my sister and my husband’s mum have cold sores, we didn’t kiss our [babies] on the lips or hands until a good few months old – just to be on the safe side,” a second wrote.
Pitching in, a third added: “Nurse (and mum) here. Babies, especially newborns, should never be kissed on the face, hands and more importantly, the mouth. This includes their immediate family. This risks the transmission of cold sores, which can make babies critically ill. Even if you’ve never had a cold sore, you can still be a carrier.”
Others took to Mecklenburgh’s post and defended the TV personality over her parenting.
“Imagine telling a mother not to kiss her baby!” one fumed.
“Shut up Karen and mind your own f***ing business!” another stressed. “If she wants to kiss HER baby, that’s her choice! I kissed my babies and I wouldn’t dare be told I can’t by some random Karen.”
According to the NHS website, HSV can be life-threatening to babies.
It reads: “Neonatal herpes is a herpes infection in a young baby. The younger the baby, the more vulnerable they are to the harmful effects of infection. It’s caused by the herpes simplex virus, a highly contagious virus that can cause cold sores and genital ulcers in adults.
“Herpes can be very serious for a young baby, whose immune system will not have fully developed to fight off the virus.”
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