PREVENTABLE FATALITIES.

Otago Witness, Issue 3803, 1 February 1927, Page 65

PREVENTABLE FATALITIES.

During the summer months of the year one cannot -glance over a newspaper without meeting with many reported cases of death or serious injury through boating, bathing, and motor- accidents. The ' Christinas holidays, are especially fruitful in. such disasters. Such fatalities cannot be altogether obviated, but certainly ’ there, is. no necessity; for them to be anything like so frequent as they are. A very moderate mastery of the art of. siyinjmiiig would save fiiany lives that are now lost through boating

and bathing misadventures. It is well that swimming is so commonly taught in schools, and that sea bathing is such frn increasingly popular form of diversion, bo that most young people have opportunities to acquire and practise an art which adds so much to human power and safety and is so healthful and pleasurable. In the roadless, bridgeless days of early New Zealand history drowning came to be known as “the New Zealand death,” so frequent were fatalities in fording or otherwise crossing swollen rivers. Now, though boating and bathing disasters account for a heavy total of deaths by drowning, the number of fatalities caused by motor traffic- must be far greater. But, of course, there is nothing peculiar to New Zealand in this frequency of motor disasters; in all countries where motors are commonly employed they take a heavy toll of lives annually, both of the people using them and of the luckless pedestrians who get in their path, the toll being specially heavy in the United States. Heedlessness, the craze for speed, and lack of capacity on the part of the driver, are responsible for the greater number of fatalities, which thus come under the head of preventable calamities. It almost seems as if death by electrocution were to supersede drowning as a distinctive New Zealand mode of death. Not, of course, that the actual number of victims of electrical accidents approaches the number of victims of burndrowning, motor, and other classes of accident, but that electrical fatalities "are proportionately common in New Zealand, and, with the great development of electric power throughout the country, threaten to increase rapidly—unless some means can be devised to make electric wires less dangerous than thev now are. The peculiar frightfulness of electrical attack is its suddenness; vou are killed or paralysed and helpless'before you know there is any. danger to guard against. You step out of your front gate in the morning, and are electrocuted by a live wire fallen on the pavement. Or, if you are a farmer, you find your best horse or several of your best dairy cows killed by touching a wire fence against which an overhead electric wire had fallen. One unfortunate farmer lately lost no less than 12 cows at once in this manner. Truly modern scientific improvements have their drawbacks and dangers! But here I am concerned mainly with accidents in the home and household and their prevention. Every day some home Is the scene of an accident causing more ®r less serious injury, often of a fatal character, and far the greater number

of victims arc little children. Probably in most cases it would be hard to say that anyone was definitely to blame for the misfortune, yet almost always more knowledge, more foresight, and'more care would have prevented it. And often presence of mind and prompt action would have prevented the accident having the serious results that actually followed. The commonest fatalities are burning and scalding accidents to young children, usually resulting in death after several hours’ suffering. A little toddler falls into a tub or bucket o£* hot water set on the floor, or perhaps climbs up on to the washing copper and slips in, or an infant in arms pulls over a teapot or a teacup of scalding tea on itself, or takes a fatal drink from the teapot spout. A child runs to the fire to warm itself and its clothes catch alight, or children left alone play with the fire or with matches and set the house on fire, perishing in the flames before the parents busy milking the cows away in the cowshed know that anything is amiss. If we consider the restlessness and curiosity of little children too young to understand danger, and think how hard pressed and hurried an unaided mother must often be, we shall find little reason to wonder at the frequency of such catastrophes, yet often the grief-stricken mother will be harassed by the thought that if she had done this or that which she did not think to do her little one would still be safe and well. It should be an invariable rule never to leave a vessel containing scalding water where a toddling infant can fall into it; in filling a child’s bath the cold water should be put in first, and the hot added as required. Fire guards might be used with advantage far more than they are, and children’s clothing might be made of less inflammable materials. It will be found that it is usually little girls who are the victims of burning accidents. I have not noticed of late so many reports of children being fatally burned through flannelette nightdresses catching fire as there used to be; possibly parents have awakened to the danger—often pointed out in coroners’ inquests—of clothing children in such an inflammable material as new ■ flannelette. The inflammability diminishes with washing, and all cotton materials may be prevented from burning readily by rinsing in alum water. I think the disappearance of the white pinafore has had the happy result of fewer little girls being fatally burned; but even now burning accidents to children are terribly frequent. I need say nothing of the burning tragedies in which children locked up in the house while their parents are out for an evening’s pleasure are victims, for I am consider-

ing ordinary preventable fatalities, not criminal ones. When a child has been burned or scalded,, even though the injuries do not seem severe, medical aid should be sought, for to a young or delicate child the shock will be very serious, and collapse or dangerous complications may follow. Presence of mind to put out the fire and apply first aid remedies is most essential. Many of the distressing burning . fatalities among women might be avoided by presence of mind. Unhappily, most girls and women, when their clothes catch fire, have a fatal propensity to.rush out of doors in search of aid, thus fanning the flames. The victim may not be able to follow the counsel of enveloping herself in a rug, blanket, or heavy cloak to stifle the flames, for such things are not usually to hand in a kitchen, where the majority of burning fatalities of this class originate, and speedy action is everything. The proper course for her to follow if there is nothing suitable at hand to wrap herself in is to throw herself on the floor and crush out the flames by rolling over and over, and this will prevent the face and head being scorched. But heedlessness is answerable for one’s clothing catching fire in the great majority of cases. Two practices are especially dangerous, heating a mixture of turpentine and wax (or other inflammable material) on a stove, and cleaning gloves or other articles with benzine near a fire or candle flame. The inflammable mixture left unwatched boils over, the benzine vapour takes fire, and a lamentable fatality results. It seems as if women could not learn the need of care in using benzine; similar catastrophies resulting from its heedless employment continue to be reported in the newspapers without apparent result in teaching caution. Just lately, a particularly sad fatality occurred through one of two young women lighting a gas iron while the other was cleaning some dress material With benzine. Care is needed in the use of electric irons and cookers; forgetting to turn off the current may result in the burning down of your home.

Next in frequency and seriousness to burning and scalding accidents come those through heedlessness about drugs and poisonous substances; and here, again, young children are the most numerous victims. Where there are young children in the house, the greatest care should be taken to keep everything poisonous out of their way. Nonpoisonous matches should be used in preference to the ordinary phosphorous ones; medicines should be kept locked up, and all poisonous substances used about the house or garden, such as carbolic acid and other disinfectants, furniture polish, caustic soda, spray for fruit trees, etc., be stored where children cannot get at them. And it is rather hard to find a place out of reach of an active, inquiring baby of two or three. It should be remembered that a great many things not commonly considered as poisonous, since they are never liable to poison grown people, may be swallowed by young children with serious and perhaps fatal effects. Paint may be licked from toys, drinks taken from bottles containing flavouring essences, cleaning mixtures, and many more things in constant use about a household. Within the last few years I have noted several cases of young children being killed through swallowing caustic soda or soap. When strong alkalis or other corrosive substances are swallowed there is terrible suffering before death results, and if, possibly, the little victim survives, it is to suffer from a constricted throat, and to drag out an existence of invalidism. Where there are young children about, the only safe rule is to look on all substances not used as food as potential poisons, and one must remember, too, that many substances used in food, condiments, flavourings, etc., are more or less poisonous if taken in quantity. Even common salt is an irritant poison if taken in excess; I have known a farmer lose a number of young pigs through the brine from salt meat being inadvertently mixed with their food. Very young children seem lacking in sense of taste to warn them against swallowing injurious substances, and in any case one swallow from a bottle holding poisonous fluid will work fatal mischief. Sugar-coated pills are naturally tempting to children, and there have been many cases in New Zealand of young children being fatally poisoned through swallowing Easton’s tabloid’s, a tonic medicine. The most active ingredient in these is strychnine, a poison which acts with such rapidity that remedies avail little. For a child of two or three -eVen one of the smaller-sized tablets would be highly dangerous, and several are certain to .be fatal. It is a good while since a fatality due to these tabloids has been reported, so it may be hoped people have learned the danger of leaving them within reach of young children. Even where'children are not in question, great care should be exercised about the bestowal of drugs and poisonous substances. They should always be conspicuously labelled, and stored quite apart from things used as food. Never take a dose of assumed medicine without making sure that it is really the medicine you mean to take; serious and fatal results have often followed on iodine, liniment, or something else for outward application being unwarily swallowed, perhaps at night time, in the dark, in mistake for some medicine for internal use. Never “throw away” poisons or poisonous substances of any description; usually the only safe course is to bury them deeply. Burning will not destroy

metallic poison. Pet dogs and other animals have often met a painful death through their owners “throwing away” unused rat poison. And on farms valuable milking cows have often fallen victims to paint, sheet-lead from tea chests, carelessly littered about the homestead. It would seem that the great drain of mineral salts caused by heavy milk production is. apt to produce in dairy cows an excessive appetite for things containing them, and if their ordinary food does not supply such salts in sufficient quantity cows will satisfy the craving by swallowing bones and all sorts of mineral substances, harmless and poison alike. Order, tidiness, and what should be common consideration for others would prevent many Natalities and much serious loss. Just lately newspapers reported si suit instituted by a fathbr to recover damages for serious'burns sustained by his little boy. It appears that some two years ago the

child, then just of an age to toddle about by itself, stepped into some hot ashes thrown out about the boarding house where its parents were staying, and had both feet frightfully burned. The child had been under surgical treatment since the accident, and further treatment would be necessary, while apparently there was a prospect that the child would be more or less lame through life. Here is ah instance of great suffering and injury to a child, and distress and loss to the parents caused by carelessness. The defence was that the child was not expected to have access to the yard where the ashes were placed. The magistrate’s decision was in accordance with reason and justice, and substantial damages were awarded, but no damages can adequately compensate for being permanently crippled. One has no right to lay traps for the unwary, and apart from danger to children grown persons might inadvertently step into live ashes thrown to the ground, to the damage of footwear, if not to personal hurt. And dogs and poultry might be injured. Moreover, careless disposal of hot ashes is a fruitful source of fires. All persons possessed of feeling hearts and adequate sense of duty will always consider the effects of their actions and will avoid doing anything that may cause injury or loss to any of their human kin or needless suffering to any of the lower creatures. If people in general acted in this spirit half, at least, of the calamitous and fatal accidents we read and hear of would be averted.

WEDDING. A New Year wedding of interest was solemnised by the Rev. MacDowall at the South Dunedin Presbyterian Church on January 5, when Olive, elder daughter of Mr and Mrs John Roy, was married to William, elder son of Mr and Mrs T. Lang, of Waikouaiti. The church was effectively decorated by friends of the bride, and Mr Leslie Adam presided at the organ. The bride, who was given away by her father, wore a beautiful frock of ivory, brocaded crepe de chines Her veil, held in place by a wreath of silver leaves, was of silk net, daintily embroidered with tiny touches of blue. She carried a lovely shower bouquet of lilies and roses and maidenhair fern. The bridesmaid, Miss Violet Roy, sister of the bride, looked very pretty in a frock of pale apricot crepe de chine over a deeper shade of the same colour, and a bandeau of silver tissue leaves, finished with a large tulle bow. She carried a beautiful bouquet of apricot sweet peas and roses, Little Joan 1 avendale, in a blue silk frock with rosebud trimming, and a bouquet of pink sweet peas, made a sweet little flower girl. Mr Arthur Lang, brother of the bridegroom, performed the duties of best -man. Mrs Roy, mother of the bride, looked smart in a navy frock with oriental trimming, and a hat of blue and grey. She carried a handsome bouquet of crimson roses. Mrs Lang, the bridegroom’s mother, wore navy marocain, relieved with white, and a black hat. Her bouquet was of white roses and sweet peas. After the ceremony about 80 guests were entertained at the Strand Salon, when the usual toasts were honoured. Later Mr and Mrs Lang left for the south, the bride travelling in a fawn marocain ensemble suit and fur, with a blue and fawn hat to match.