Sixty-five percent of the incidents happened in a pool owned by the child's family and 33 percent o the incidents happened in a pool owned by friends or relatives. Pool submersions involving children happen quickly. A child can drown in the time it takes to answer a phone. Seventy-seven percent of the victims had been missing from sight for 5 minutes or less. Survival depends on rescuing the child quickly and restarting the breathing process, even while the child is still in the water.
Seconds count in preventing death or brain damage.
Child drowning is a silent death. There's no splashing to alert anyone that the child is in trouble. From the beginning of a child's life, products, such as cribs, high chairs and other equipment intended for a child must be selected with safety in mind. Parents and caretakers of babies and young children need to be aware of the many potential hazards in their environment - hazards occurring through misuse of products or those involved with products that have not been well designed for use by children.