There is such joy when we spend time with our grandchildren, but, when this Grandma has “responsible” time, I am more vigilant than I was as a parent. I do not want anything to happen to the grandchildren on my watch.
However, sometimes there are dangers we do not think about. For example, a report found that about 6,000 trips to the emergency room by children under age 6 were connected to the laundry packets in 2012 and 2013. In the New York Times article, “Detergent Pods Pose Risk to Children, Study Finds,” by Catherine Saint Louis, November 10, 2014, she brings out that “critics say the colorful laundry packets look too much like candy or teething toys.” This Grandma agrees. And now those pods are everywhere, dishwashing detergent and more. She writes:
“Since the introduction of colorful, single-load packets of laundry detergent in 2012 through the end of 2013, more than 17,000 children under age 6 ate or inhaled the contents or squirted concentrated liquid from a packet into their eyes, researchers reported Monday.”
“These 17,000 children we found amounts to one child every hour being exposed to one of these laundry pod products,” said Dr. Marcel J. Casavant, a study author and the medical director of the poison center at Nationwide Children’s Hospital in Columbus, Ohio. “That’s a very different order of magnitude than other hazards.”
“Most of the cases occurred among children aged 1 or 2, and nearly 80 percent involved ingestion of the contents of a packet. Two deaths of children have been confirmed, one in Florida and another in New Jersey.”
“Most commonly, children vomited, became lethargic, irritated their eyes, coughed or choked, the researchers found. About 6,000 were seen in emergency rooms. About 750 were hospitalized, and half required intensive care. The laundry packets tend to burst in a child’s mouth, and the concentrated contents can be swallowed all at once.”
“They are made with almost like a very thin Saran wrap that dissolves when wet,” said Dr. Cynthia Aaron, the medical director of the Regional Poison Control Center at Children’s Hospital of Michigan, which contributes to the national database. “They bite on it, and the contents go to the back of their throat.” . . . .
It is good to know the symptoms if a grandchild accidentally bites into such a pod. Now we grandmas know to keep these items locked away and being careful with use. We need to have the telephone number of poison control available at all times:
1 (800) 222-1222 American Association of Poison Control Centers
Hours: 24 hours, 7 days a week Languages: English Website: www.aapcc.org
One great outing with grandchildren that is educational and useful to grandmas is taking them to the supermarket. I like to target some section to teach them, for example, the fruit section to let them see and smell different fruits and take one example of several home to taste. This Grandma was concerned when I read that “shopping carts might not seem a particularly dangerous place for a child, but from 1990 to 2011, an average of 66 children a day wound up in emergency rooms after injuries sustained in and near them.”
In the New York Times article on line, January 30, 2014, by Nicholas Bakalar, “Shopping Cart Injuries Remain Common, he writes:
“Researchers studied children under 15 and made estimates of injuries based on a sample of emergency room visits in 100 hospitals nationwide. Most of the injured were children under 4 who fell out of a cart, and more than 90 percent of their wounds were to the head. Carts tipping over, running into or falling over the cart, and entrapment of extremities accounted for the rest of the damage. The findings are published online in Clinical Pediatrics,”
“Over all ages, about 80 percent of injuries were to the head, 14 percent to the upper extremities, and 6 percent to the lower extremities. In the 22 years covered by the study, about 16,500 children were injured seriously enough to be admitted to a hospital.”
This Grandma was always worried about germs on the carts, always buying the cutest cart covers for babies. See for example.
Now, I worry more about the toddler and preschool and even school age children in those carts. Our grandchildren like to take a ride on the outside of the cart holding on—no more! We cannot turn our heads or move away from those cards for a moment
May we always share wonderful times safely with our grandchildren with
Joy,
Mema
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