Hello everyone, I’m Sarah Pryde-Smith, CEO of Simba Charity and a bereaved parent.
Simba is a Scottish baby loss charity dedicated to honouring and remembering babies who have died at any stage of pregnancy or shortly after birth. At Simba, our mission is clear: to ensure that every bereaved family in Scotland is supported with compassion, dignity, and meaningful opportunities to create memories with their baby.
Why Memory Making Matters
For families facing the unimaginable pain of losing a baby, memory-making can be a lifeline. Our signature Simba Memory Boxes—filled with items designed to help parents gather and keep precious memories—are provided in hospitals, homes, and communities across Scotland.
We also work closely with clinical teams to create dedicated bereavement rooms, safe and comforting spaces where families can spend time with their babies. These rooms allow parents to spend time with their baby, creating memories and saying goodbye in their own time and their own way.
A New Strategy for Change
In January 2025, we launched our new three-year strategy, built around five core priorities:
- Equity in memory making
- Ongoing remembrance in communities
- A people-centred, inclusive culture
- Advocacy and awareness
- Financial stability
One of our biggest ambitions is ensuring that every bereaved family in Scotland —no matter where they live or what their circumstances are—has access to high-quality, compassionate memory-making support.
While memory-making is recognised within the National Bereavement Care Standards for Scotland, its delivery varies enormously. Some parents receive deeply meaningful care; others receive nothing at all. This inequality cannot continue. Baby loss touches every community, and services must reflect the diversity, complexity, and needs of the families they serve.
A Charity with Proven Impact—But No Core Funding
Despite the critical role we play, Simba receives no core funding. Our modest £500,000 annual turnover relies heavily on public fundraising and increasingly competitive trust and grant applications. This makes long-term sustainability a constant challenge.
We also face barriers in accessing the data needed to fully understand and evidence our impact—data that is essential for improving services and advocating for change.
Collaboration for National Change
Recognising these wider challenges, Simba co-founded the Scottish Baby Loss Collaborative in 2024, alongside six sister charities: Held In Our Hearts, Sands, Baby Loss Retreat, the Scottish Cot Death Trust, the Miscarriage Association, and ARC.
Together, we champion:
- Equitable access to specialist bereavement care and dedicated spaces
- Consistent, trauma-informed, person-centred support
- Legislative recognition of baby loss in public policy
- Inclusion of bereaved parents in designing services
- Fair funding for the third sector as an essential partner
- Reducing stigma and raising awareness of the lifelong impact of baby loss
This collaboration is a powerful, united voice calling for compassionate, consistent care for every family in Scotland.
Working Alongside Voluntary Health Scotland
We are deeply grateful to Voluntary Health Scotland (VHS) for being a vital ally in this work and were delighted to see The Manifesto for Health Creation echoing many of the principles we advocate for, including:
- Embedding lived experience in decision-making
- Fair and sustainable funding for third sector organisations
- Rights-based, person-centred approaches to tackling health inequalities
- Improved access to, and control over, personal health data
Simba was proud to contribute to the consultation that helped shape this important manifesto. We remain committed to working collaboratively with VHS and others to ensure the voices of bereaved families are heard, respected, and acted upon.
Moving Forward, Together
Baby loss is a heartbreak felt across all communities. By working together—families, charities, clinicians, policy-makers, and partners—we can build a Scotland where every bereaved parent receives the compassionate care they deserve.
At Simba, we will continue to honour babies, support families, and advocate for a future in which remembrance, equity, and dignity are at the heart of baby loss care.
Gift Precious Memories this Christmas
If you would like to help us continue to bringing comfort, light, and precious memories to families across Scotland who have gone through the loss of a baby, please consider supporting our Gift Precious Memories campaign:
£15 helps us provide a Small Memory Box
£20 helps us provide the contents of a Medium Memory Box
£30 helps us offer memory-making opportunities within a Large Memory Box
While your donation will support our work, you can also honour your baby, or a baby dear to your heart, by naming a robin on our virtual tree: https://visufund.com/simbas-robin-tree
