Home Safety During the Coronavirus Pandemic: Creating a Safe Place for Young Kids to Play
While we are all social distancing during the coronavirus pandemic, our homes are not just a place for us to live—they have become our offices, schools and playgrounds. In our last home safety blog, we talked about the importance of keeping all cleaning products and medicines out of reach of children. But home safety does not stop there.
To our youngest, most imaginative family members, it may seem like every room or piece of furniture in the house is now a new place for them to climb or explore. We know that our homes and furniture are not designed to be playgrounds, so here are three tips to help create a safer place for your kids to play in your home.
- Mount flat-panel TVs to the wall and place large, box-style TVs on a low, stable piece of furniture that can hold the weight. Use anti-tip brackets, braces or wall straps to attach top-heavy furniture to the wall. By securing TVs and furniture, you can help prevent tip-overs if your child tries to pull themselves up from the ground using these objects.
- Watch children around balconies and windows. Now that the weather is starting to get warmer, we may be tempted to open our windows to get some fresh air. Window screens are not strong enough to hold a child’s weight, so install window guards or stops and move furniture away from windows to prevent falls. It’s still important to know how to open the window in case of emergency.
- Use safety gates at the tops and bottoms of stairs and attach them to the wall, if possible. Give yourself some peace of mind knowing that your littlest ones cannot access rooms they aren’t supposed to while you are trying to balance working and parenting. Make sure to read the manufacturer’s instructions and warning labels to make sure you have the right gates for your needs.
For more information, check out our home safety checklist or visit safekids.org.
See our other blogs on how to help keep kids safe during the coronavirus pandemic and beyond. If you have a question for one of our experts, please email Gary Karton at [email protected] and we’ll include it in a Q&A to help you and other caregivers.
