Tomorrow, April 1, marks the beginning of National Window Safety Week. I’ve written about the dangers of open windows on several occasions in the past, notably last summer when there was a spate of Oregon injuries to children stemming from open-window accidents in the Portland area. In one particularly disturbing incident a toddler in Southeast Portland suffered a skull fracture after falling from a second-story window.
Raising awareness, and stopping preventable accidents like this, are the goals of National Window Safety Week, which is organized by Safe Kids USA (see link below).
A key element of awareness – one that should be emphasized to every parent of a small child – is the fact that screen windows offer only a false sense of security. As the Safe Kids website says: “screens keep bugs out, not kids in.” To ensure that children do not press on screens and tumble through the window, “window guards should be installed to prevent the little ones from being able to fall outside. They are easy to install and should have a release mechanism in the event of an emergency or the need to move to another window,” the website states.
Safe Kids, through both its national website and its Oregon and Washington chapters, offers numerous useful tips on this and many other important aspects of child safety. Preventing injuries to Oregon’s children should be a priority for all of us: Oregon child injury attorneys, families and neighbors alike. Raising awareness with events like National Window Safety Week is important, but the real work goes on every week of the year.
SafeKids USA: News release regarding National Window Safety Week