Moro reflex

Affected infants are normal at birth but, after a few days, cease to suck, show lethargy and go rapidly downhill. They lose the Moro reflex, show diminished consciousness, have periods of coma, are hypertonic, show rigidity and, sometimes, opisthotonos. Some have seizures—in all the E.E.G. is grossly abnormal. The cerebral degeneration is rapidly progressive and they die, usually in respiratory failure, after a few weeks or months. Rarely, some live for almost two years at the other extreme, in the first few cases described, the infants died within two weeks of birth. 

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