Safety for Children

As we turn the corner from summer to fall, September not only brings with it the start of school, but Baby Safety month as well. Is your house as safe as it could be for your baby or toddler? Here are some great pieces of advice from the Juvenile Products Manufacturers Association:

This September marks the 25th anniversary of Baby Safety Month, sponsored annually by the Juvenile Products Manufacturers Association (JPMA). This month-long campaign exists to educate consumers and raise awareness of safety issues surrounding the proper use and selection of juvenile products.

“Keeping a child physically safe is the most basic of all parental responsibilities,” says Mike Bost, vice president of Palmetto Childproofing Inc, a professional babyproofing company that services Charlotte, NC and surrounding areas.

According to the American Academy of Pediatrics, one million children seek medical attention each year because of unintentional injury, and approximately 50,000 suffer permanent damage.

With over seven years in the child safety industry and extensive experience in childproofing nearly two thousand homes, Bost says that the best defense against injuries to babies and toddlers in the home is for parents to provide a safe environment in which their baby can live, learn, explore, and play.

He recommends that all first-time parents get a child’s eye view of the world. “Get down on your hands and knees,” says Bost, “look around inside your home, and see what your child sees through his or her eyes. You may be surprised at what you see. The obvious hazards and dangers will stare right back at you.”

With the wide variety of child safety products on the market, the prospect of babyproofing a home can seem overwhelming for many parents. Bost says selecting the right safety products the first time is important to avoid the hassle and inconvenience of returning items that do not work or fit properly.

He suggests that parents experiencing difficulty or frustration babyproofing their home consider using the services of a professional childproofer. “Professional childproofers are intimately familiar with child safety products,” Bost says, “and they have considerable experience installing baby gates, cabinet and drawer latches, and many other childproofing products that parents sometimes find difficult to install on their own.”

As Baby Safety Month gets underway, Bost says he welcomes the opportunity to promote child safety and focus parents’ attention and efforts in making their home a safe haven for their little one.

New York state’s attorney general Andrew Cuomo is fighting to have all child pornography and other questionable material blocked from the internet. With the help of several of the country’s largest internet service providers, he’s off to a good start.

"I feel parents should be with their children or at least in the same room with their children while they’re on the Internet and they should know what sites they’re going to," said Sue Berti of Cicero.

And if they can’t be with their children 24/7, Attorney General Andrew Cuomo wants to help. The father of two is on a mission to get every Internet provider in the state to block child pornography.

A total 15 Internet providers in Central New York and the Southern Tier have agreed to block child pornography sites. Our Nneka Nwosu reports on the state’s efforts to make the Internet a safe place for children.
   
Cuomo said, "It’s one of those issues that everybody says it’s terrible and we’ve got to do something about it. And years and years go by and we don’t do enough."

In the last year and a half, 15 Internet providers in Central New York have agreed to block underage porn sites. But that’s not enough. Cuomo says his office and these parents and teachers must also educate children about Internet safety.

The back and forth debate over Bisphenol A and “is it safe?” has been settled by the Food and Drug Administration. Used in many products out there, including baby bottles and child drinking cups, it was once thought as unsafe for children but now that appears to not be the case.

Bisphenol A, the controversial plastic chemical, is safe at typical exposure levels from food and drink, according to an FDA draft report.

The draft report states that based on lab tests in rodents, infants and adults are exposed to bisphenol A levels that are below toxic levels. "Safe or safety means that there is reasonable certainty in the minds of competent scientists that the substance is not harmful under the intended conditions of use," but "complete certainty of absolute harmlessness is scientifically impossible to establish," the draft report states.

What to do in the meantime? Here’s what the FDA told consumers in April, when the media frenzy began. It’s advice that focuses only on baby bottles, not other sources of bisphenol A.

"At this time, FDA is not recommending that anyone discontinue using products that contain BPA while we continue our risk-assessment process. However, concerned consumers should know that several alternatives to polycarbonate baby bottles exist, including glass baby bottles."

Even with summer coming to a close soon and children returning to school, there are still plenty of child safety risks associated with summer that need to be addressed in the home. The biggest of course being swimming pools, and a news outlet in Ontario, California addresses the issue with swimming pools on the property of unoccupied homes.

"These foreclosed, unmaintained, unoccupied homes are the new killer in your neighborhood," said Joe Powell, emergency medical services coordinator for the Rialto Fire Department.

Forty-four kids in the county from only a few months to 5 years old drowned between 2000 and 2005, according to the California Department of Health. There were 130 nonfatal, hospitalized injuries from near drowning or submersion.

Officials said unsecured, untreated pools at foreclosed homes not only pose a health hazard but can also prove fatal to kids attracted by water toys left by previous occupants.

Older kids are not immune to accidents at the pools either, they said. Abandoned pools turn green with time, hiding plastic bags and other trash that can entangle anyone who may fall in, officials said.

There are 853 vacant, unsecured properties in the city, said David Hernandez, senior code officer. His department has answered 155 calls for abandoned pools. Twenty-one calls remain active.

Hernandez urged residents through the county to call local code enforcement to secure abandoned pools.

Officials reminded the public that drownings among kids nationwide increase by 89 percent between May and August, and home swimming pools are the most common site for drownings among children ages 1 to 4.

If you know of a swimming pool on an unoccupied or abandoned property, call the city codes office immediately and alert them to the danger.

Should schools get state rankings on allergies and asthma? There are rankings for other forms of child safety, and some special interest groups think asthma and allergies should be no exception. From ABC.com:

After years of taking calls from concerned parents or school administrators, the Asthma and Allergy Foundation of America or AAFA noticed that "some states are just better than others when it comes to protecting their child’s safety," said Mike Tringale, director of external affairs at the Asthma and Allergy Foundation of America.

By safety, Tringale means the care for allergies and asthma. Other things like gun safety may seem more important to adults than irritating conditions like allergies or asthma. But the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reports that childhood asthma rates doubled since 1980 and that asthma is the third-ranking reason for a kid to go to the hospital.

"Asthma is the number-one chronic reason why children miss school in the U.S.," said Tringale.

With that in mind, the Asthma and Allergy Foundation of America set out to recognize the best states for asthma and allergy policies. Some did fantastic, others did not.

Check out the story for the best states for allergies and asthma.

As more and more teens are using social networking sites such as Facebook and MySpace, parents are scrambling to keep up with them and make sure they are making safe choices online. While some may not understand the system, others are signing up for their own profiles so that they can keep tabs on their children, even going so far as to use the services to communicate with them.

In general, teenagers are closer to their parents today than in previous generations, says Nancy Robinson, consumer strategist for Iconoculture, a cultural trends research firm in Minneapolis. Kids today often prefer hanging out with their parents to being holed up in their room, she says.

That can easily extend to social networking sites, which – after texting – are the No. 2 way that teens communicate technologically, according to Don Tapscott, author of "Growing Up Digital" (1997) and the upcoming "Grown Up Digital" (both from McGraw-Hill Professional).

Does this always work to the parents advantage though?

Some experts warn that parents who "friend" their kids without being invited to can send the teens a message that they don’t trust them. Michael Solomon, a professor of marketing at Saint Joseph’s University in Philadelphia, says teens who post suggestive photos or inappropriate messages will block their parents from accessing the information anyway.

"It can backfire," says Solomon. "It can embarrass the kids and their friends and create resentment."

Do you follow your child’s activity on social networking sites?

In the wake of the news that Amber Alerts are being questioned by some, it is great to hear stories when they do actually work, especially in text book fashion. After an Amber Alert was issued for six children who had been taken by their mother from their father’s home, a concerned citizen noticed the Amber Alert and just happened upon the car from the Alert.

A man and woman who were headed to a Laundromat at the shopping center noticed that the green Mazda MPV minivan looked similar to the one described on the news after an Amber Alert was issued for the missing children, Nelson said.

The woman had even written down the van’s license plate number when she heard about the Amber Alert.

When the couple realized it was the same vehicle, the man blocked in the minivan with the couple’s car and yelled to someone at a nearby check-cashing facility to call 911, Nelson said.

All of the children are safe and are in the process of being returned to their father.

Are your kids eating properly when you have to grab a quick bite? A study from the Center for Science in the Public Interest says that a startling amount of kids meals from various restaurants far exceed the number of calories, sodium and fat content that a child should be consuming in any given meal.

Ninety-three percent of the 1,474 options had more than 430 calories, they found. Forty-five percent of the options were too high in saturated and trans fat, and 86% were too high in sodium.

Five meal choices earned CSPI’s "Hall of Shame" award. On that list:

 

• Chili’s country-fried chicken crispers, cinnamon apples, and chocolate milk, with 1,020 calories
• Chili’s cheese pizza, homestyle fries, and lemonade, with 1,000 calories
• KFC’s popcorn chicken, baked beans, biscuit, fruit punch, and Teddy Grahams, with 940 calories
• Burger King’s double cheeseburger, fries, and chocolate milk, with 910 calories
• Sonic’s grilled cheese, fries, and slushie, with 830 calories

If you are looking for healthier options for your children, be sure to consult the nutrition guide offered at many restaurants. If you live in New York City, San Francisco or Portland, nutrition information is provided for you on each menu.

The Albuquerque Express sheds some light on new legislation passed by Congress regarding the use of certain chemicals in children’s toys.

The US House has voted overwhelmingly to ban lead and other dangerous chemicals from certain items.

The legislation is intended to toughen rules for testing children’s products and give more power to the Consumer Product Safety Commission.

The legislation came about after a flood of goods from China were deemed hazardous to children.

The bill will also ban children’s products containing six different types of phthalates, which are chemicals that are found in plastics and suspected of posing health risks.

The 424-1 vote now sends the measure to the Senate.