Last summer over an 11 day period, eight toddlers drowned in backyard swimming pools. This year, that number must drop.
We've launched a ‘PoolSafe’ program designed specifically to teach families about pool safety and basic rescue techniques. We'll be rolling this out amongst our current teachers but at the moment it's only available in the Eastern Suburbs of Sydney.
Swimming pools are great fun, but they can be dangerous too. We have developed a fun-packed one hour lesson for the whole family that runs through potential pool hazards, safety drills and easy rescue techniques that even grandma can do.
The lesson includes games, races, competitions and quizzes as well as some play-acting of real-life scenarios. It is endorsed by the Royal Lifesaving Society of Australia. Grant Davis, Aquatic Industry Services Manager from Royal Lifesaving hopes that the initiative will reduce the drowning rates this year.
“The home pool remains the number one location for drowning deaths of children under five. We hope that these lessons and our ‘Keep Watch’ campaign will help us reach our goal of zero child drownings this year. Every child drowning is preventable”
The swimming pool remains the number one location of drowning deaths for children under five with nearly half or 15 of the 35 drowning deaths occurring in a backyard pool. "The Keep Watch campaign reminds backyard pool owners of the importance of restricting a child's access to the pool area with appropriate pool fencing, self closing and self latching gates, and constantly supervising children when they are in, on or around the pool.
The Keep Watch campaign continues to look for innovative ways to get these important actions to parents and carers. Eliminating drowning in backyard pools remains Royal Life Saving's major priority and new strategies are being developed to ensure pool owners are aware of the Keep Watch campaign and take action to reduce the risk of drowning.
It is the responsibility of all pool owners to ensure their pool meets Government safety requirements. Backyard pools are required to be fenced, and the gates must be self closing and self latching, not only to protect the home occupiers but also to protect those invited or uninvited guests.
Young children need to be supervised constantly (within arms' reach) whenever they are in, on or near water. Restricting a young child's access to water either by putting a barrier around the water or around the child is also effective in preventing drowning deaths.
Undertaking water familiarisation with your child will help you to become aware of the dangers.
Learning resuscitation can help if an incident does occur.