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Kidsafe ACT |
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About Kidsafe We all like to think that we take good care of our children, yet despite our best intentions, each day in Australia around 5,000 children are involved in some type of accident that requires medical attention. Around 170 of these kids will be admitted to hospital, and one will die. Remember that is an average day, every day of the year. It’s a scary thought that so many of our children are being needlessly injured, for nearly every accident is preventable. That’s why Kidsafe – the Child Accident Prevention Foundation of Australia, was formed. We know of many of the things that can be done to achieve a further dramatic reduction in the number of deaths each year – if only we can get to parents often enough, at the right time, and with the right messages. Since its beginning in 1979, funded initially by grants from Federal and State Governments, corporations, and by donations, the main goal of Kidsafe has been to reduce the number and severity of unintentional injuries to children. In those 24 years Kidsafe has made a real difference. The number of children killed as a result of injuries has halved. Kidsafe’s main activities have been to conduct child safety campaigns on issues such as the prevention of injuries from
Kidsafe was influential in the establishment of a national child injury surveillance database. This has enabled much of the key injury prevention work that has been undertaken since the late 1980’s. Over the last decade, Kidsafe has made great progress, but there is still a need for ongoing research and injury prevention programs. At stake is the health and wellbeing of Australia’s most valuable asset – its children. Achievements Kidsafe has had many notable successful campaigns Prevention
of Pool Drowning In Australia, drowning is still the single biggest cause of death in toddlers, and most of these are in backyard swimming pools. Pool Fences Save Lives: Kidsafe initiated a television campaign promoting the importance of pool fences. Developed as a Community Services campaign, it ran with over $1mill of television air time. An information kit for all Local Councils, which provided technical and practical information on the pattern and prevention of pool drowning, supported this campaign. Every summer, Kidsafe now conducts water safety programs in most Australian States. Pool drownings have been significantly reduced. Bicycle
Helmets Fit a helmet. Save a life: Wearing a bicycle helmet greatly reduces the risk of head injury in a crash. Kidsafe played an important role in assisting State and Territory governments to develop and introduce appropriate legislation requiring the wearing of bicycle helmets. We have assisted road authorities to promote the helmet laws and their correct use – especially in schools. Smoke Alarms
Smoke alarms save lives in the home: Kidsafe has campaigned for years for their mandatory installation. Working with fire authorities, Kidsafe has contributed to the spectacular rise in the percentage of households fitted with smoke alarms from just 1% in 1991, to 84% in 1998 in Victoria for example. Joint advocacy has now resulted in most States and Territories requiring smoke alarms to be fitted at least to all new houses and to all rental properties. Burns and Scalds
Hot water buns like fire: Kidsafe developed an education campaign warning of the dangers of scalding from hot water, primarily in the bathroom. This has now been run a number of times across Australia. Secondly, we advocated changes in practice and legislation to limit hot water temperatures to a maximum of 50deg. Celsius in the bathroom. Thirdly, we have negotiated changes in advertising style with commercial groups, so that manufacturers and energy suppliers would cease to focus on very high temperatures for hot water. Parent Advice
Early Childhood Injury
Prevention Program: Kidsafe established a program to provide child safety
information to parents during maternal and child health clinic visits. It has been adopted in most States
and is now part of mainstream education by maternal and child health nurses. Home Safety/Home Design
We’ve taken the results of research on home injury and made it available to parents in an informative booklet entitled “A Parents’ Guide to Kidsafe Homes”. Already over 500,000 copies have been distributed. We’ve also made information available to the building industry via Kidsafe demonstration homes and the publication of a builder’s guide to safety. A safety centre was built in 1999 at Westmead in New South Wales. Playgrounds
Kidsafe conducted research into the pattern and causes of playground injury, developed print material on playground safety for Councils and assisted in the revision of the Australian Standard. We also established a playground safety network and conducted Australian Playground Safety Conferences in 1996 and 1998. Our NSW Division runs a Playground Safety Advisory Service. Child restraints
Despite the use of these being mandatory there is still a need for continuing promotion of their correct fitting and use. One of the results of our activities has been the development of a simple publication entitled “A Parents’ Guide to Kidsafe Cars”. In 1995 we conducted a major campaign in partnership with Shell Australia, to distribute information about child restraints through Shell outlets. This program was supported by a Community Service television campaign. The Foundation successfully sought the personal intervention of the Prime minister, Mr Howard, to ensure that motor vehicle restraint from the Trans Tasman Trade Agreement which otherwise would have allowed the sale of products of a lower standard than were permitted in Australia. Two of Kidsafe’s Divisions provide Infant Restraint Loan Services and other Divisions have a variety of restraint-related initiatives. In 2002 Kidsafe also conducted a series of free restraint checking days in conjunction with General Motors and its dealerships. Kidsafe Week
Initiated to raise awareness that injury is the leading cause of child ill health and death, Kidsafe Week ran annually for some years from 1994. Our most recent innovation was the Annual Kidsafe Award, sponsored by the Federal Department of Health and Aged Care. This award recognises individuals and organisations who have made significant contributions towards preventing accidents to children. Key issues for the future
Our vision lies in “Making a Safer World for
Kids”. In order to maintain our role as a leading
advocate for child safety in our adult focused world, we need to continue to
promote safer design and practice, initiate extensive media campaigns and
conduct other activities that will reduce the number of injuries to
Australian children. One of the most important things we can do is
to continue to speak out for child safety and to push for changes that will
provide a safer environment.
This involves drawing on the services of individuals and organisations to work collaboratively with us
towards that end. At a national
level, Kidsafe develops “best practice” advice for injury prevention and
co-ordinates programs across the country. Pilot Programs must continue to be a
priority. These enable us to develop and implement injury prevention programs
that will reduce the incidence and severity of injuries resulting from
scalds, burns, falls, drowning, poisoning and road related accidents. And finally, policy advice based on research
is a major function of Kidsafe.
This area requires increasingly specialist attention because of the
time required to become familiar with the issues concerned. We need to be able to respond
quickly. Traditionally we have concentrated on
providing parents with advice and information, but we will now extend our
target market to include all child care givers and in particular
grandparents, childcare centre staff, and new parents. The ultimate aim of this strategy is to
increase community and consumer demand for improvements in home safety. Issues which require particular attention
include toy safety, poisons, nursery furniture and water safety. We also need to influence industry
towards safer design and manufacturing. How we go about it
Kidsafe is comprised of members who pay an
annual subscription. The
membership base includes community groups, members of the medical profession,
many of Australia’s leading injury prevention professionals, professional
child care organisation,
corporate organisation,
trusts and members of the public. Kidsafe is governed by a voluntary Board
comprising a representative from each State and Territory division, two
nominees of the Commonwealth Minister for Health and Aged Care, and six
directors elected by members of the foundation. The Board of directors adopted our second
five year national strategic plan, “Making a Safer world for kids” in
2001. This ensures that both the
national office and each State Division has an annual business plan which is
formulated in the context of the foundation’s strategic plan. A number of sub-committees are appointed
including a Development Council to build business opportunities and raise
income, a Steering Committee which drives the programs related to our major
sponsorships, a Product Review Committee which assesses products submitted
for Kidsafe endorsement and an Audit Committee. External consultants provide accountancy and audit
services. An annual Report is prepared and lodged with
Australian Securities and Investments Commission. The policies of the foundation are developed
by the Board of Directors supported by ten full-time and twenty part-time
staff who are also responsible for program implementation. Kidsafe has office in every
Australian State and Territory, with the National Office located in Brisbane. A Targeted Approach
Working at both a national and
State/Territory level, we are able to concentrate our efforts in the areas of
most need. Whilst in Victoria and Western Australia the
focus may be on Home Safety, at the same time, the Northern Territory may be
concentrating on playground safety.
NSW might run an on-going pedestrian and cyclist program, while road
safety may take first priority in Tasmania and South Australia. “Dogs ‘n’ Kids might be the focus in
the ACT, or drowning prevention in Queensland. Layered over this, would be a series of
national programs which may consist of media campaigns, advisory groups,
safety research and ongoing work with industry and regulating authorities
designed to lead to safer products and effective regulations. This combination of grass roots state
activities combined with a strong national presence not only makes Kidsafe a
more effective Foundation, but also enables it to work collaboratively with a
number of organisations
across Australia to help us achieve our goals. These groups include Australian Red Cross, St
John Ambulance, Royal Life Saving society, Farmsafe Australia, Monash University Accident Centre, Australian
consumer Association, Australian College of Paediatrics, the Maternity and Paediatrics Hospital in each State, Childsafe
NSW, Resuscitation Council of Australia, National and State Injury
Surveillance, International Child Injury Association, Injury Control Forums,
National Child Protection Council, State and Federal Departments of Health,
Federal Bureau of Consumer Affairs and the Standards Council. Kidsafe
Activities in the ACT
Over the last ten years, Kidsafe in the ACT has developed a range of activities that work together to progressively improve parents’ awareness of the need for safe behaviours and actually to change behaviour. This combination of activities is essential for us to make a difference and provides a variety of opportunities for sponsoring organisations to contribute o Talks Program: The Program is currently focussed on antenatal centres at Canberra, Calvary, John James & Queanbeyan Hospitals, the Playgroups Association and early childhood centres. We are currently expanding its breadth and scope to also cover more Day-Care establishments and Pre-schools and further regional centres in the Southern Area Health Service region of NSW. The Program focuses each talk on the needs and issues for the specific group being addressed. We already contact well over 1,500 families a year. o Infant Restraint Loan Service (IRLS): Kidsafe lends infant car restraints to about 2,000 families a year, generally for about 6 months for each capsule and a limited number of car seats for short-term hire. These families generally stay in regular contact with Kidsafe to buy safety-related equipment etc or for safety-related information after returning the capsule. This program has recently been extended to Queanbeyan Hospital o Free Restraint Checking Service: As part of the IRLS we provide a free checking service for restraints already fitted to cars and will fit owned restraints for a small fee. o Information Service: Some 14,000 people a year contact Kidsafe ACT, largely by telephone, with specific safety-related questions. Distribution of information will be further expanded through ACT Early Childhood Centres and a pilot program being considered with Guild Pharmacies to have a variety of Kidsafe safety information for distribution by the Centre or pharmacist. o Kidsafe Centre: The Centre, at Pearce this year is now supported by new satellite Centres at Canberra and Queanbeyan Hospitals. It operates the Infant Restraint Loan Service, the Talks Program, and the Information Service. It also has a variety of safety devices for demonstration and sale and information on a wide variety of safety-related issues. In the Hospitals, the Centres provide permanent safety displays and have safety information available. Kidsafe is currently holding discussions with the NSW Southern Area Health Service and a number of local Councils about the possibility of setting up satellite Centres in the regional hospitals. These satellite Centres will provide selected services under to supervision of the main regional Kidsafe Centre. o Community Education: Kidsafe provides regular content in newspapers, magazines, on radio and through TV appearances. This includes regular, monthly advertisements and editorial in the ACT newspapers and articles in magazines for Scallywags and ACT Playgroups Association. Prime TV regularly runs safety advertisements s part of a national sponsorship arrangement. o School Safe: Implementation of this program will be completed in all ACT Primary Schools by the end of 2003 and its effectiveness monitored during 2004 through ongoing support from NRMA Insurance. It provides a mechanism for schools to improve safety at the school, whilst integrating these changes into the safety-related curriculum and the school’s relationship with its parent community. It is associated closely with the related Health Promoting Schools initiative in high schools. o Safety Improvement Programs: Specific initiatives are taken from time to time. These focus on the key injury causes and are based on proven interventions. Where possible we work with other related organisations (eg Royal Life Saving Society, Urban services, WorkCover, Emergency Services). For example, the Kidsafe Homes booklet is currently being distributed to most new parents in the ACT. In February 2003 Kidsafe launched two safety improvement programs addressing the major injury areas of Hot Water Scalds and Poisoning, to be conducted jointly with ACT WorkCover. The other two major national injury issues (apart from Road Safety) are Drowning for which we distribute campaigns from the Royal Life Saving Society) and Falls covered through the School Safe Program with ACT Education and a new Falls Program to be launched by Kidsafe early in 2004. o Interactive Displays: Kidsafe appears at a variety of public displays each year, the locations depending on the availability of funding to support our work. These include stands at ACT Alive, Teddy Bears Picnic Day, Canberra Hospital Paediatrics Open Day, Central Family Day Care, Pet Expo, Home Show and the National Science Festival. Safety material is also permanently available at the MBA’s permanent Home Improvement Centre display.
o Advocacy: We are constantly active with the Government and Providers in advocating a safer environment for children. Recent initiatives include, achieving improvements in hot water regulations, our involvement in the 50kph local street debate and changes to national road regulations relating to child restraints in vehicles. |
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