We are sure that we have written about this issue more than once, especially in the summer, when high temperatures become unbearable, imagine you in a closed car, in the sun, for hours.
This is the time when we have to take special care if our passengers are those who cannot fend for themselves: our little children, our elderly and our pets.
Every summer, preventable and heartbreaking deaths occur when children are left alone in hot cars. Last June, CNN reported that the number of hot car fatalities nearly tripled compared to the same time in 2015, which had 24 hot car deaths in total.
Overall, 52 percent of these deaths are due to neglect forgetting a child in a car. “In the worst case, if a child is small and on the sunny side of the car, death can occur in 15 minutes or less,” says Jan Null, Certified Meteorological Consultant.
Our pets, like children, are less able to cool off compared to adult humans. Each year thousands of animals also die as a result of excess heat when left in a closed vehicle.
However, believe it or not, pets are better protected than children by the current legal system. There are more states with laws against leaving pets in the car than the 19 states with laws against leaving children in the car.
Nobody is exempt from committing this carelessness. A former Georgia police officer faces felony charges after authorities say two police dogs were killed in his care. Daniel Peabody, 50, was arrested on charges of aggravated animal cruelty and making false statements to a law enforcement official, the Cherokee County Marshal’s Office announced.
“Parents leave children in a car for lack of knowledge about how quickly they can get sick,” says Christopher Haines, DO, director of pediatric emergency medicine at St. Christopher’s Children’s Hospital in Philadelphia. “On a day when the temperature is 72 degrees Fahrenheit, the temperature inside a car can increase by 30 to 40 degrees in an hour, and 70 percent of that increase occurs in the first 30 minutes,” He says.
These cases occur when children are left unattended in a hot car – sometimes because the driver forgot that the child was there – or when children get into cars and the doors are unlocked, without any adult knowing what is happening. In a matter of minutes, they may be in danger. If you are driving with children, a pet or elderly people as passengers, before leaving your vehicle, please make sure to look in the back seat.
Maybe you are leaving behind a valuable and precious cargo!
