Many parents wonder what causes cerebral palsy, and why their child has this condition. There is a simple explanation for this, for no one can have cerebral palsy unless they have brain damage. Children can experience brain damage in several ways. An injury to the brain can take place in the unborn child in the form of a developmental malformation. This is when the brain simply fails to develop the way it is supposed to. During and after birth, a child can suffer neurological damage to the brain. Some of what causes cerebral palsy is an injury such as lack of oxygen, or an infection that causes bleeding into the brain. Any injury that happens to the brain during birth could have more than likely been prevented. Mistakes that are made during a birth have affected many thousands of children negatively, and are responsible for many thousands of cerebral palsy cases.