Boosting Safety for Texas Kids
Boosting Safety for Texas Kids
Boosting Safety for Texas Kids
Texas children from ages five through seven face an extra element of danger when they're involved in car accidents. They face the prospect of disability and even death caused by seat belts designed for adults. Seat belts can cause severe injuries to children buckled in without a booster seat.
The Texas legislature recently sent Senate Bill 61 to Governor Rick Perry to update our state's laws, requiring booster seats for children from five through seven (unless they are over 4 feet 9 inches tall).
According to the National Highway Transportation and Safety Administration, safety belts are not designed for children. After age four, many children have outgrown their car seats but are too small for adult safety belts. Booster seats provide better protection by raising children up so that the safety belt fits correctly.
The NHTSA says those kids don't have the physical stature to be fully protected by adult safety belt systems. Often, kids are moved prematurely to safety belt systems designed for adult passengers. Because adult safety belts are not designed to fit young children correctly, their use places young children at risk for abdominal, spinal, head and facial injuries.
Safe Kids Greater Houston, an affiliate of Safe Kids USA, states on its website that, among children of an age that booster seats would be appropriate, auto accidents are the leading cause of death and injury.
In a commentary for the Austin American-Statesman, Dr. R. Todd Maxson, trauma medical director of Dell Children's Medical Center of Central Texas, wrote, "In my 12 years of practice as a pediatric trauma surgeon, I talk with parents daily who assume the restraint law is based on scientifically sound recommendations from experts they assume their child is well protected. SB 61 corrects this gap in our present law, protects children and will save lives."
On the boosttexas.org website, stark statistics make a strong case for enacting the new law. According to TX EMX and Trauma Registry, only 12.5 percent of booster-age kids in Houston are riding on booster seats. Slightly over 55 percent are in adult seat belts, while 32.1 percent are riding around unrestrained (in violation of current law). In Austin, only 6 percent are riding on booster seats, while 41 percent are completely unrestrained, with the remainder strapped in by adult seat belts. In San Antonio, only 12 percent are seated on appropriatechild booster seats , while 57 percent are using adult seat belts and 31 percent have no protection whatsoever.
Texas is one of only six states without a child booster seat law.
The personal and financial costs of these accidents involvingimproperly protected childrenare enormous. A 2006 report by the Texas Department of Public Safety stated that, "A child who is less than 4 feet 9 inches tall, using only an adult safety belt, experiences major internal organ injuries when involved in a motor vehicle crash . Texas could reduce the cost of health care by more than $17 million if these children were required to use the appropriate child safety seat or booster seat."
If the governor signs SB 61, starting in June 2010, violators would be fined $25 on the first offense and up to $250 on subsequent offenses.
The booster seats are widely available, starting as low as $15.
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