Summer vacation is the time when many children return to their hometowns to play with grandparents and family. However, the risk of drowning in ponds, lakes, rivers and streams in children is always potentially high due to lack of skills and close supervision by adults.
Therefore, proactively implementing measures to prevent drowning and teaching children how to defend themselves is necessary this summer.
Do not let children play or swim at ponds and lakes on their own.
Parents and relatives need to regularly remind children not to voluntarily go to dangerous areas such as ponds, lakes, canals, rivers and streams to play or take a cool bath without adults accompanying them.
For young children, direct supervision is very important because accidents underwater can occur in just a few minutes of losing vigilance. Families also need to guide children to recognize dangerous places to raise awareness of self-protection.
Equip children with self-protection skills
Learning to swim is considered one of the effective measures to help children reduce the risk of drowning. However, besides swimming skills, children also need to be guided on how to float on the water, how to call for help, use floating objects and stay calm when encountering problems.
Guide children to adhere to the 3 no principles: Do not swim in the absence of adults; Do not swim in places with warning signs; Do not jump down to save friends. When a person is found drowning, children are only allowed to shout for adults and throw floating objects (bamboo poles, ropes, plastic cans) to the victim.
Family strengthens child management
During summer vacation, children often have more time to play outdoors, so the risk of accidents is also higher. Therefore, families need to assign someone to look after children, avoiding subjectivity or thinking that someone else has noticed.
In addition to supervision, parents should also regularly talk to their children about the consequences of drowning accidents, thereby helping children raise awareness of self-protection when playing near rivers and streams.
Propaganda on drowning prevention skills
For schools, before each summer vacation, strengthen propaganda on drowning prevention skills through activities, extracurricular activities or life skills guidance.
In addition, organizing swimming classes and basic first aid and rescue skills training also helps students gain more necessary knowledge and skills to respond when encountering dangerous situations.
Localities review and warn of dangerous areas
For local authorities, it is necessary to inspect and install warning signs in deep ponds, large rivers, and dangerous canals; and at the same time add barriers in places where children regularly pass by.
In particular, the locality also needs to coordinate with mass organizations to open free swimming classes, create safe playgrounds for young children during the summer vacation to limit the situation of children spontaneously gathering to swim in the river.
A safe summer not only requires the care of the family but also the joint efforts of schools, local authorities and the whole society. Proactively implementing drowning prevention measures will help children have comfortable, meaningful and safe summer vacations.
