Many Drowning Deaths Of Children Across Asia Preventable, Says Report

KUALA LUMPUR, May 23 (Bernama) -- A new report states that although drowning is a leading killer of children across parts of Asia, highly effective and cost-efficient programmes to reduce such drowning deaths are not being sufficiently embraced. The research, conducted by The Alliance for Safe Children (TASC) in collaboration with Unicef's Office of Research, had surveyed four countries --Bangladesh, Cambodia, Vietnam and Thailand -- together with two provinces in China -- Beijing and Jiangxi. It found that in those countries one of every four child deaths (one to four years) was due to drowning -- more than the number who die from measles, polio, whooping cough, tetanus, diphtheria and tuberculosis combined. It also stated that the cost of preventing drowning among children is no more expensive than interventions for these diseases. "For too long, drowning has been a hidden killer," said Gordon Alexander, director of Unicef's Office of Research, in a statement. "Over the past three decades, countries have made strong, continuous progress on infectious disease reduction. However, no impact has been made on drowning deaths. "As a result, drowning is emerging as a leading cause of death for children after infancy (one year) in the countries surveyed for this report. And yet, drowning is off the political radar," said Alexander. The statement, however, did not provide the number of deaths. The statement said the vast majority of the drowning deaths were preventable. They tend to occur within 20 metres of the home and are the result of unsupervised children wandering off and falling into local water hazards. The report highlighted new evidence in prevention interventions in an operational research programme in Bangladesh, showing that drowning death rates among children attending village crèches were reduced by more than 80 per cent as a direct result of having adequate supervision. It also reported that drowning death rates in children four years and older who participated in SwimSafe (swimming and safe rescue training) were reduced by more than 90 per cent. -- BERNAMA