May 1, 2023 • 6 mins
The tragic death of Bucs linebacker Shaquil Barrett's two year old daughter Arrayah underscores the importance of preventing child drownings. It's the number one cause of death for toddlers aged one to four years old. Adam Katchmarchi PhD is executive director of the National Drowning Prevention Alliance.
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Episode Transcript
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(00:01):
Gordon Byrd here with Beyond the Newsfrom the WFLA newsroom. Terrible tragedy over
the weekend that unfortunately is all toocommon. In this case, it involves
someone who's well known in the TampaBay community. Bucks linebacker Shaquille Barrett,
lost his two year old daughter onSunday morning in an incident of drowning in
(00:22):
a pool, and unfortunately, drowningis all too common, especially when we're
talking about that age group of youngchildren. It is a very common cause
of death. We have Adam Cathmarchyon the line who is in town.
He is with the National Drowning PreventionAlliance and this is obviously an issue that
they deal with all the time,so I wanted to talk with him about
(00:46):
some of the important measures as faras keeping children safe, particularly if you
have a pool at your home orapartment. Adam, welcome to Beyond the
News. Thanks so much for havingme, Gordon, and to start off
to offering our deepest thoughts and condolencesto the Barrett family. This is such
a tragic incident and you're rated soit's too common that this happens, especially
(01:10):
in Florida, and just want tostart off with the condolences, and yes,
it is all too common, andI believe, if I'm not mistaken,
it is the number one cause ofdeath in Florida and many other states
for those in the age group ofone to four years old. Yes,
it's actually, unfortunately now the leadingcause of the single leading cause of death
(01:32):
for children ages one to four nationwide. But it is a very high leading
cause of death for children, especiallyin the top of age range here in
the state of Florida. And thisis obviously continued to be an issue for
many years, and it begins tobe more of an issue as we move
into spring and summer and people arespending more time outside and spending more time
(01:53):
with the water, and spending moretime at the pool and there are I'm
sure your organization is in the businessof promoting ways to keep children safe around
water and around pools. So ifyou could kind of touch base with us
and kind of go over the basicshere that FOS need to remember. Yeah,
(02:15):
and you know, one of thethings that I like to clear up
at the very OSTs that is thereare so many misconceptions about childhood drowning,
especially we've mentioned that it's the leadingcause of death for children they just want
to form any parents are unaware ofthat. Many parents are also unfortunately unaware
of how quick these incidents can happen. Drowning can happen and as little as
(02:36):
thirty seconds, and it often issilent, so a parent is not likely
to hear their child calling out forhelp. And another important statistic to keep
in mind, especially with factyard pools, is our data shows us at about
seventy percent of toddler drownings are happeningduring non swem times, So we remind
everyone, no matter what body wateryou're around, to practice what we call
(02:57):
the five layers of protection. Thatincludes using barriers and alarms to restrict access
to water, especially during non swimtimes, making sure there's constant and capable adult
supervision, making sure a child getswater, competent or learns to swim,
and as early as possible. TheAmerican Academy of Pediatress even recommends getting children
in swim lessons as early as ageone, the proper use of life jackets
(03:20):
in certain environments, and then alsomaking sure you are prepared for an emergency.
Because as we all like to highlight, especially with this tragic accident with
the Barrett family. This is trulyan accident, and accidents do happen,
and as many prevention steps as wecan take is great, but we always
want to be prepared for an emergencyto happen, so making sure you're trained
(03:42):
in CPR, especially with rescue breasts, I mean, the difference between life
and death. You've obviously been involvedwith this issue for some time. Is
the message getting through? Is thereprogress on this front? Are we seeing
improvement in terms of lives being savedand fewer children being lost to drowning.
(04:08):
We were making fantastic progress over thelast twenty years of slowly seeing our drowning
rate across the country, especially inFlorida, come down slightly. Unfortunately,
since the pandemic, we've seen ourdrowning rates, especially in children's fight and
even here in the state of Florida, we're seeing many much higher drowning rates
of children than pre pandemics. Sowe do need people to recognize that even
(04:30):
though there's not a single bullet solutionto prevent drowning, it does take multiple
safety steps to play working together.This is a highly preventable accident and unfortunately,
what I hear from parents who havelost a child to a drowning are
the words I didn't know. Theydidn't know it was believing cause of death,
They didn't know what safety steps andpaper, They didn't think that would
happen to them. But this accidentcan happen so quickly, so we want
(04:55):
to make sure parents do take thoseproper safety steps before a tragic accident happens.
Do you have a possible explanation asto why this might have increased during
the pandemic. Maybe there we're notas much there was not as much going
on in terms of swimming lessons oranything like that. What's what's the explanation
being offered. That's a really goodquestion, Gordon. I wish we had
(05:19):
the answer to that. Unfortunately,our data is not complete enough to give
us the answer. But we doknow there are a higher number of backyard
pools. We do know people changethe way they re created during the pandemic,
and you know many parents have changedtheir working habits, and drowning can
happen quickly when you're least expecting it, So always being on guard, especially
(05:40):
when there is anybody of water presentaround the child, and especially just remember
it's not just during swimtimes. It'salso during non swimtimes when the child is
least likely that you're not expecting themto go back to the water, that's
actually when they're risking be highest.So it's clearing up these misconceptions and also
making sure that we're constantly practicing thosefive or simple Thanks doctor Adam kats Marchi,
(06:02):
PhD with the National Drowning Prevention Alliance, Thank you very much for joining
us on beyond the news. Thanksso much for me
Gordon Byrd here with Beyond the Newsfrom the WFLA newsroom. Terrible tragedy over
the weekend that unfortunately is all toocommon. In this case, it involves
someone who's well known in the TampaBay community. Bucks linebacker Shaquille Barrett,
lost his two year old daughter onSunday morning in an incident of drowning in
(00:22):
a pool, and unfortunately, drowningis all too common, especially when we're
talking about that age group of youngchildren. It is a very common cause
of death. We have Adam Cathmarchyon the line who is in town.
He is with the National Drowning PreventionAlliance and this is obviously an issue that
they deal with all the time,so I wanted to talk with him about
(00:46):
some of the important measures as faras keeping children safe, particularly if you
have a pool at your home orapartment. Adam, welcome to Beyond the
News. Thanks so much for havingme, Gordon, and to start off
to offering our deepest thoughts and condolencesto the Barrett family. This is such
a tragic incident and you're rated soit's too common that this happens, especially
(01:10):
in Florida, and just want tostart off with the condolences, and yes,
it is all too common, andI believe, if I'm not mistaken,
it is the number one cause ofdeath in Florida and many other states
for those in the age group ofone to four years old. Yes,
it's actually, unfortunately now the leadingcause of the single leading cause of death
(01:32):
for children ages one to four nationwide. But it is a very high leading
cause of death for children, especiallyin the top of age range here in
the state of Florida. And thisis obviously continued to be an issue for
many years, and it begins tobe more of an issue as we move
into spring and summer and people arespending more time outside and spending more time
(01:53):
with the water, and spending moretime at the pool and there are I'm
sure your organization is in the businessof promoting ways to keep children safe around
water and around pools. So ifyou could kind of touch base with us
and kind of go over the basicshere that FOS need to remember. Yeah,
(02:15):
and you know, one of thethings that I like to clear up
at the very OSTs that is thereare so many misconceptions about childhood drowning,
especially we've mentioned that it's the leadingcause of death for children they just want
to form any parents are unaware ofthat. Many parents are also unfortunately unaware
of how quick these incidents can happen. Drowning can happen and as little as
(02:36):
thirty seconds, and it often issilent, so a parent is not likely
to hear their child calling out forhelp. And another important statistic to keep
in mind, especially with factyard pools, is our data shows us at about
seventy percent of toddler drownings are happeningduring non swem times, So we remind
everyone, no matter what body wateryou're around, to practice what we call
(02:57):
the five layers of protection. Thatincludes using barriers and alarms to restrict access
to water, especially during non swimtimes, making sure there's constant and capable adult
supervision, making sure a child getswater, competent or learns to swim,
and as early as possible. TheAmerican Academy of Pediatress even recommends getting children
in swim lessons as early as ageone, the proper use of life jackets
(03:20):
in certain environments, and then alsomaking sure you are prepared for an emergency.
Because as we all like to highlight, especially with this tragic accident with
the Barrett family. This is trulyan accident, and accidents do happen,
and as many prevention steps as wecan take is great, but we always
want to be prepared for an emergencyto happen, so making sure you're trained
(03:42):
in CPR, especially with rescue breasts, I mean, the difference between life
and death. You've obviously been involvedwith this issue for some time. Is
the message getting through? Is thereprogress on this front? Are we seeing
improvement in terms of lives being savedand fewer children being lost to drowning.
(04:08):
We were making fantastic progress over thelast twenty years of slowly seeing our drowning
rate across the country, especially inFlorida, come down slightly. Unfortunately,
since the pandemic, we've seen ourdrowning rates, especially in children's fight and
even here in the state of Florida, we're seeing many much higher drowning rates
of children than pre pandemics. Sowe do need people to recognize that even
(04:30):
though there's not a single bullet solutionto prevent drowning, it does take multiple
safety steps to play working together.This is a highly preventable accident and unfortunately,
what I hear from parents who havelost a child to a drowning are
the words I didn't know. Theydidn't know it was believing cause of death,
They didn't know what safety steps andpaper, They didn't think that would
happen to them. But this accidentcan happen so quickly, so we want
(04:55):
to make sure parents do take thoseproper safety steps before a tragic accident happens.
Do you have a possible explanation asto why this might have increased during
the pandemic. Maybe there we're notas much there was not as much going
on in terms of swimming lessons oranything like that. What's what's the explanation
being offered. That's a really goodquestion, Gordon. I wish we had
(05:19):
the answer to that. Unfortunately,our data is not complete enough to give
us the answer. But we doknow there are a higher number of backyard
pools. We do know people changethe way they re created during the pandemic,
and you know many parents have changedtheir working habits, and drowning can
happen quickly when you're least expecting it, So always being on guard, especially
(05:40):
when there is anybody of water presentaround the child, and especially just remember
it's not just during swimtimes. It'salso during non swimtimes when the child is
least likely that you're not expecting themto go back to the water, that's
actually when they're risking be highest.So it's clearing up these misconceptions and also
making sure that we're constantly practicing thosefive or simple Thanks doctor Adam kats Marchi,
(06:02):
PhD with the National Drowning Prevention Alliance, Thank you very much for joining
us on beyond the news. Thanksso much for me
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