Car safety advocate asks for all-out effort to prevent hyperthermia deaths

In July a 4-year-old died after being left in an SUV in West Palm Beach, Florida on a 90-degree day. His body temperature rose to 108 degrees, according to the Associated Press.  A day later in Dallas, a 19-month-old girl died and police suspect she was also left in a hot car.

Such incidents are sadly in the rise. The number of hyperthermia deaths resulting from kids being left in cars has jumped ten fold, from just 11 in the period from 1990-1992 to 110 in the period from 2004-2006, according to Jannette Fennell, president of Kids and Cars, an advocacy group. There have been 23 such deaths reported so far this year, she says.

Fennell, however, takes heart in the news that in the same time frame deaths from air bag deployment deaths have fallen. Last year, in fact, there were no deaths related to the deployment of airbags, the first time that has happened since 1992, according to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration.

Fennell attributes this success to a campaign in recent years to have children ride in the back seat. And she is hopeful that, just as with the reduction in air bag deaths, that new technologies, beefed-up regulations, and safety education programs can be developed to reduce the number of deaths from hyperthermia.

“As summer temperatures soar and hyperthermia deaths grow, there is an immediate need to create and implement a public campaign to educate parents, caregivers and others about these horrific incidents and the proven paths to take to avoid them," said Fennell. "Technology needs to be in the forefront of this solution to prevent unnecessary deaths and save innocent lives.”

Fennell says that investing in a few safety advances such as alert signals could help remind parents that they have youngsters on board. “Vehicle reminder systems currently tell us our keys are still in the ignition, our headlights are on, a door is open, or that we need to buckle up,” says Fennell. “Sensor-driven technology exists that could alert a stressed and distracted parent who is rushing to work when a child dangerously remains in the rear seat.”

Like the airbag deployment problem, Fennell says solving the rapidly escalating hyperthermia problem will require an all-out effort including education, enforcement and technology improvements and the commitment of industry, government regulators, and safety groups.

At least one good opportunity to help tackle the problem has already been fumbled away, she says.

A provision for a "driver reminder system"  to prevent children from being left alone in a vehicle was originally included in the Cameron Gulbransen Kids Transportation Safety Act, a landmark piece of child safety legislation passed by Congress earlier this year. Unfortunately, the driver reminder system language was dropped from the legislation before it was passed into law.

More on hyperthermia
Our video (above) details the dangers of leaving children or animals in vehicles and our Cars blog recently wrote about the hazards of hot cars.  The Kids and Cars Web site also offers advice for parents.

Comments

[Augustine]

Just like the driver's seat-belt has a sensor to chime when he doesn't wear it, the same sensor could be added to the rear seat-belts to chime if leaving the car with them buckled, assuming that at least younger children would be on baby seats or boosters.

[Susan]

Can anyone give good advice on how to lower the temperature of the car before we put our kids inside? Do these devices such as "auto-cool"...do they work?
This of course would not prevent the deaths by leaving the children in cars, rather I just wanted to ask seeing as my poor baby seems to suffer initially when I put her in the car (even having run the air before hand).

[C]

leave you kid in the back seat?
Simple, when you put a child in the back seat also put your purse/briefcase there also.
You don't walk into the office, etc without either do you?
Why don't people just make it a habit to look in the rear seat whenever they exit their car/van??

[Sandra McIntosh]

My heart go out to the families of these tragic events. Not only do they have to deal with the loss of a child, the have to deal with the guilt of knowing that something that they did, or didn't do is the reason for the loss. Although I couldn't imagine it, I know that we are all capable of making such mistakes.

[Peter T.]

I'm all for child safety and car safety, but I think it's a futile battle trying to make a car idiot proof for idiots. The responsibility to avoid this type of senseless tragedy must be placed squarely on the parents and not on the automakers. Technology can't always come to the rescue to bail out the clueless or the self-absorbed.

The answer to this problem is better parent education about their total responsibility for the safety of their child.

I'd rather have the car manufacturers focus their limited resources on more important safety issues like better braking and better survivability of drivers and passengers during crashes.

[Fred Suza]

In addition to the deaths referred to above there were two in Houston, Texas one day apart. Since most of these deaths seem to be occurring when the mother or other female custodian is in the car, am not suggesting males would do any better) it has been suggested that a simple solution would be for the person to put her handbag in the REAR of the car where she would have to look for it. That might lower a number of these casualties.

[Kevin Kelly]

Working in the Rental Car industry for the last 12 years, you would be stunned by the number of infants left in the back of our vehicles. People get so distracted, the airlines put such time pressure on our customers that they just forget the infant is in the back seat.

We will be moving vehicles or cleaning them, when our employees come in to say we have another baby left in the car. I have seen a Mother faint on our shuttle bus when she realized she left her infant in the rental car.

In all the incidents of infants being left in rental cars only once did we contact the Police because the parents had boarded their flight. Normally we find the infant about the same time, the parents figure out their baby is missing.

I hope the manufacturers come up with a good "fail safe" system for this problem. This will not happen unless mandated by the Federal Government.

I hope it happens soon. Sundays in August our returned vehicles can sit up to 2 or 3 hours before being cleaned. Those vehicles heat up quickly and it is just a matter of time till the worst happens.

Just so you know, infants are not the only things left behind. Wallets, firearms, large sums of money and more than anything else, cell phones. In Phila. we get at least 30 cell phones a month.

[yehudith ben menahem]

i actually don't know whom to address this letter BUT THIS IS A COMPLAIN!!! regarding a stroller, chicco brand. this morning i put my 4 month old girl on it, set her beside me while i washed the dishes. she was contented for a while playing then suddenly she cried. i got nervous seeing her head being catched between the backrest and the iron stand unable to move. i checked the old stroller of my older children and i found out that the old one has a sturdy sideflap that prevents the head from sliding to side and endanger the child.to add with it, i also found the foot of my girl with cuts and scratches due to the uneven, unpolished underside of the front plastic guard. what can i do about this unsafe product? please help!