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What an amazing week!
To raise awareness for the 500 children who die every day on the world’s roads – that’s one every three minutes – we participated in the United Nations Global Road Safety Week’s #slowdown campaign placing a special focus on how speed impacts the safety of children.
On August 1, 2014, my beloved 27-year-old son “Benjo” drowned in the Bahamas while practicing for spearfishing. Benjo was extremely adventurous, artistic, outgoing and he had a great sense of humor. He was also an accomplished athlete; a state champion alpine skier, sailing instructor and SCUBA instructor with over 1,500 logged dives. The fact that he lived on top of and underneath the water for the better part of his shortened life made his death even more incomprehensible.
Between all the prescriptions, over the counter drugs, vitamins and supplements for ourselves and our families, many of us have several bottles and boxes of medicine in our homes. It can be hard to keep track of it all, and if we have young children at home, too, that can be a recipe for disaster. As a child safety researcher, it’s part of my job to think about how medicine is stored around kids.
Poisoning is a risk children face and when it happens it is especially tragic because it can easily be prevented. Medicine can be kept up and away from kids. Cleaning and laundry supplies can be secured. Child resistant containers can be used to keep kids out of medications and substances like liquid nicotine.
But when it comes to serious risks of poisoning from lead in paint from decades ago, many parents and communities need help to protect their kids.
This year, we are marking 10 years of progress in reducing drowning deaths among our kids through passage of the Virginia Graeme Baker Pool & Spa Safety Act (VGB). There’s been a 25 percent reduction in U.S. pool deaths among children in the past ten years. On May 24, 2017, members of the Senate Committee on Commerce, Justice, Science and Related Agencies heard testimony about the law.
Here’s your safety assignment for the week:
Grab your helmets and take a bike ride with your kids. Why? Well, beyond the obvious reasons, it’s because Safe Kids has a new way for you to evaluate how bike friendly your city or town is for kids.
The resident dads at Safe Kids were asked about what piece of advice or tip they would want other dads to know about. We are certainly no experts (is there really such a thing?), so take what you like and ignore the rest.
School is out and summer is finally in full swing. Whether your plans include backyard barbecues and road trips or bike rides and beach vacations, we’ve got some tips to help parents keep kids safe while they have fun in the sun.
Whenever we talk about how to store medicine safely, it always comes back to one thing above all – the importance of keeping medicine up and away and out of reach and sight, every time. And when we spoke to parents this past year for our latest research report on the topic, we found that by and large, parents know that, with 9 in 10 agreeing that it’s important to store all medicine up high and out of reach after every use.
For three years, I volunteered as a camp counselor at Lake Arbor Summer Enrichment Camp, a summer camp for children aged 6 through 12. The camp was designed to be an enriching experience for kids, and activities during the day included tennis, swimming lessons, creative writing and chess. We also organized field trips to places and landmarks in Washington, D.C. such as the Smithsonian, the National Air and Space Museum and Frederick Douglass’s house. The campers got a lot out of it, and they showcased it during chess tournaments and talent shows.