Posts Tagged ‘WTHR’

This week, the local NBC affiliate (WTHR) ran a story on the danger of swimming pools. Attorney Ken Nunn ran a similar opinion piece. Contact your local representative to get the laws changed to protect our children from the dangers of swimming pools.

A full copy of the opinion piece is below.

Summer is now in full swing, and that means Hoosiers of all ages are out enjoying a dip in one of the thousands of public swimming pools in Indiana. What they may not realize is that many of these facilities are not in compliance with new federal regulation, and pose a threat to children and families.

I’m talking about pool drains – the devices found at the bottom of most pools that suck in water for filtering. What most people don’t know is that these drains are powerful enough to hold a child underwater, and even injure or kill them. In many instances frantic parents have tried to pull their child off the drain, but been unable to overcome hundreds of pounds of suction pressure.

According to Safe Kids USA, at least 33 people have been killed by being entrapped by a pool drain between 1985 and 2004, and countless more injured. Among the latter have been serious brain damage due to lack of oxygen, and scars that will last a lifetime. In a few gruesome cases, children have even been partially disemboweled by a pool drain.

As things often go, it wasn’t until the loved one of someone famous and powerful was hurt before something was done.

In 2002, the 7-year-old granddaughter of former U.S. Secretary of State James Baker was killed when she got sucked into the drain of a hot tub and couldn’t be freed. After years of political pressure and lobbying, the Virginia Graeme Baker Pool Safety Act was passed in 2007.

That law mandated that drains in about 300,000 public and hotel pools and hot tubs be covered with larger, rounded covers that do not allow as much suction, and that there be a back-up mechanical system such as an automatic shut-off device installed in those pools that have a single main drain.

This new protection was supposed to go into effect before the summer of 2009. Unfortunately, manufacturing issues as well as lax enforcement have resulted in many public swimming pools failing to comply with the federal safety requirement for improved drain covers.

And in March of 2010, a majority of the federal Consumer Product Safety Commission voted to reinterpret the law so as to remove the requirement for the shut-off mechanism, enraging safety advocates.

The end result is that many Indiana public swimming pools are no safer than they were when the law was passed four years ago. Most of the new drain covers that were made have since been recalled, and some public pool operators have claimed they lack the funds to install new and improved ones.

The Consumer Product Safety Commission, which is in charge of enforcing the federal law, is a tiny federal agency with few resources. The CPSC has largely looked to state and local authorities to ensure that public pools comply.

The federal law was a good start, but we need to be more proactive here in Indiana to ensure it is properly complied with, so as to prevent more Hoosier injuries and deaths due to pool drains.

Every public facility with a pool or hot tub that is not in compliance with the federal law should be required to display a sign saying so. That way, parents will have the information they need about whether or not their public pool is really safe.

Perhaps the Indiana Legislature should even require that all pools have a sign stating whether or are not it is in compliance. Then Hoosier families could choose to avoid public pools that don’t have safe drain covers. That would produce a powerful financial incentive for pool operators to take steps to comply with the law, and make public pools in Indiana safe to swim again.

I would urge you to contact your Indiana state representative or senator and urge them to introduce a bill requiring the proper warning signs on public pools immediately, before there is unnecessary death and injury.

For more information, go to www.BadLawsforGoodPeople.com.

Healthbeat Reporter Anne Marie Tiernon from WTHR-TV Channel 13 visited Alliance Home Health Care on Friday, April 16.

She reported on The Nostalgia Program, an in-home dementia specialty service that engages clients in recreation, promotes relaxation, encourages reminiscence, builds relationships and provides resources to clients’ families.

Check out this link to Anne Marie’s story: http://www.wthr.com/Global/story.asp?S=12326182

For inquiries about the Nostalgia Program or any of the Alliance services, please call 317-581-1100 or visit http://www.alliancehomehealthcare.net.