As part of its awareness campaign to decrease the number of preventable deaths among children in Qatar, HMC is focusing on educating the community about water safety, officials have said.

This appears to be part two of the “Kulluna” (all of us) campaign, a five-year initiative that kicked off last month with a drive to seatbelt children.

The number of drownings in Qatar involving children has doubled to 25 from 2011 to 2010, with accidents taking place in swimming pools, baths and even buckets of water, statistics show.

The vast majority of cases involve toddlers who drown when no one is watching them, Al Saad Pediatric Emergency Center’s senior consultant Dr. Khalid al-Saadi said.

Gulf Times reports:

“Because children under two years have heads proportionately heavier than the rest of their body, they can easily topple into water. A child can drown in less than two minutes in as little water as 5cm deep, in absolute silence,” Dr. al-Saadi cautioned…

The official also cautioned that children who survive drowning could suffer from permanent disability such as irreversible brain damage and spinal cord injury that could cause lost of motor functions like walking, talking and movements of some parts of the body.

The newspaper also provides tips to protect children from drowning, including:

• Maintaining adult supervision within arm’s reach of the child in the bathroom and at the pool, or anywhere else where water is present;
• Installing a gate to prevent direct and unintentional access to sources of water at home by children;
• Teaching a child to learn to swim as early as possible;
• Explaining the dangers of water when they are old enough;
• Learning to perform CPR to use if a water-related accident occurs, as the first few minutes following such an incident are critical.

More information on CPR training can be found at City Center mall this weekend, by emailing [email protected] or visiting Kulluna’s website.

Thoughts?

Credit: Photo by Doha Stadium Plus