Are your Water Babies little lifesavers?
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There’s nothing quite as fun as a family
splash about, whether at the pool or
beach. But new research has revealed
that millions of children are at risk due
to a lack of water safety awareness and
swimming skills.
Water Babies, the UK’s leading baby
swim school, commissioned a research
study of 2,000 families’ swimming
habits. The results revealed that more
than half of the parents surveyed said
that they wouldn’t feel confident their
child could save themselves if they got
into trouble in the water, and 44% admitted that they themselves wouldn’t
feel confident in their own swimming
skills to rescue their child. In fact, 16%
of parents confessed they couldn’t even
swim at all.
Half of parents surveyed admit they
have lost sight of their child for long
enough during a holiday to cause panic. The majority of holiday accidents
occur in the first or last hour at a resort,
when parents are most likely to be distracted.
75% of parents surveyed were totally
unaware that drowning is the third
highest cause of accidental death in
children. This is particularly worrying
as around 60 children drown in the
UK every summer and 75 UK citizens
drown on holiday abroad each year.
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Paul Thompson, Water Babies
co-founder, says: “It’s vital to encourage children to respect water from as
early an age as possible. Our research
showed that the average age children
start swimming lessons is four years
old and 40% of children haven’t had a
lesson by the age of 12. But swimming
lessons can actually can take place from
birth, in fact, our youngest pupil was
only two days old.
“It’s tragic that drowning is still the
third highest cause of accidental death
for UK children. In most cases it’s the
shock of sudden submersion that causes children to panic. We believe that
by introducing children to the water as
early as possible, they are less likely to
experience fear if they do fall in.
“With progressive training, babies can
be taught lifesaving skills such as turning on their backs or, following sudden
submersion, swimming to the nearest
solid object. Over the last few years a
dozen of our pupils have saved themselves from drowning, some of whom
were just two years old.”
With these statistics in mind, Water Babies compiled a list of five top tips for
parents and five top tips for children,
to keep the whole family safe around
water.