Tribune Media Services
(Tribune Media Services) -- It's never going to happen to you, right?
You're never going to be that hapless parent in the ER someplace far from home with a badly sunburned child (as happened to me in Hawaii), or one who has hit her head falling off a bike, broken his wrist on the playground or swallowed Dramamine from the glove compartment (yes that was me too) or worse.
A lot worse. Every day this summer, 17 children will die from unintentional, but mostly preventable, accidents reports Safe Kids Worldwide, www.safekids.org, a not-for-profit organization charged with reducing childhood injury. Forty-one percent of accidental deaths for children occur during the summer months. Kids will be rushed to emergency rooms nearly 3 million times this summer from car crashes, bike accidents, falls, drowning, ATV accidents and more. Experts believe many accidents happen on vacation.
"Parents may be distracted by the fun of a trip and have a tendency to not be as vigilant," says Dr. Denise Dowd, associate professor of Pediatrics, University of Missouri-Kansas City School of Medicine, and a spokesman for the Academy of Pediatrics. (Visit the American Academy of Pediatrics Website at www.aap.org for summer safety tips.)
Whether on vacation with the kids or enjoying the summer at home, you can't let down your guard -- even for a moment, says Alan Korn, director of Public Policy and General Counsel for Safe Kids Worldwide.
All of us shuddered at the news that 4-year-old Madeleine McCann went missing from a Portuguese resort condo in May. Her parents, both physicians, were eating dinner 50 yards away, returning to check on Madeleine and her younger siblings often. The hunt for Madeleine continues.
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But even that benign visit to grandma's can prove dangerous if the house hasn't been child proofed, says Dowd. "Bring your own portable crib rather than using one at a hotel or a relative's house that is who-knows-how-many years old," Korn adds, along with your own crib sheets. Those that are too large can be a hazard to a baby.
Get your baby's safety seat checked before you leave to make sure it's installed correctly. According to Korn, four out of five seats the Safe Kids' inspectors check at safety events around the country are not installed correctly. Even worse, children 4 to 8 (40 to 80 pounds) are not sitting in booster seats, though they can reduce the risk of injury by 59 percent. (For more on car safety and information on where you can get your safety seat inspected, visit www.usa.safekids.org or The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration www.nhtsa.dot.gov/)
Even if the kids whine, insist they wear appropriate safety gear -- life jackets on boats, and helmets when doing wheeled sports. The one time 12-year-old Tommy Michalson skateboarded without a helmet -- "on a wide smooth sidewalk," while his family was vacationing from Kansas in Colorado last summer he fell and suffered a head injury so severe he died 13 hours later. The anniversary of his death is this month.
"Our message and hope is that parents make sure that helmets are worn EVERY time their child participates in a wheeled sport, even if it is just on the driveway or a sidewalk," Cheryl Michalson, Tommy's mom, said at a Washington, D.C., safety event recently.
"Most people don't realize that injury -- not cancer, nor any other illness -- is the number one killer of children in this country," says Safe Kids' Alan Korn. Significantly more of these injuries happen in summer than any other time of the year, he explains, because kids -- and their parents -- are outside doing activities that while fun, can present risks, whether at a skateboard park, a hiking trail, a pool or a beach.
Be especially careful near water. Drowning is the second leading cause of unintentional injury-related death to children ages 1 to 14, according to Safe Kids. Sixty-four percent of all children's drowning deaths occur during the summer. And it's not just babies who get into trouble. Insist older kids and teens swim with a buddy. "Drowning can happen so quickly," says Dr. Dowd.
Even 17 years later, Stew and Kim Leonard can't believe how quickly. One minute 21-month-old Stewie Leonard was helping his dad put up balloons for his sister's birthday party at a rented vacation house in the Caribbean; the next minute he was gone. Leonard thought his son had wandered into the kitchen where his wife was; she thought the toddler was with her husband.
By the time they found him in the pool a few minutes later -- a balloon floating nearby -- it was too late. At least half a dozen adults were around the pool at the time but no one noticed. Nearly nine in 10 drowning-related deaths occur while a child is being supervised "Just talking about it I feel a lump in my stomach," Leonard, the scion of a prominent Connecticut family, says. "Your eyes have to be glued on your child."
To promote water safety, The Leonards established the Stew Leonard III Water Safety Foundation and, with the help of their four daughters, have written "Swimming Lessons with Stewie the Duck," and "Stewie the Duck Learns to Swim"(available with a CD for $4.95 from www.stewleonards.com. All proceeds go to the foundation; a Spanish edition will be out this summer.)
Worldwide Safe Kids suggests parents download a Water Watcher Card from www.usa.safekids.org: While you've got the card, you are responsible for watching the kids in the water. You're not to talk on the phone, read, or grab a beer until you've handed over the card to another adult, says Korn, noting that drowning doesn't happen like in the movies. "Nobody screams or thrashes. A child goes under and that's it."
"We want kids to have fun," he says, "But on vacation, you've got to keep being a parent." E-mail to a friend 
(For more Taking the Kids, visit www.takingthekids.com, where Eileen Ogintz welcomes your questions and comments.)
Copyright 2007 EILEEN OGINTZ, DISTRIBUTED BY TRIBUNE MEDIA SERVICES, INC.
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