12.06.12
England one of safest countries for young people
A new report card shows that England is one of the safest countries in Europe for children and young people.
The European Child Safety Alliance says that in England, injury death rates – both accidental and intentional – rank second out of 31 countries for males and third for females. However, the card suggests that injury still accounts for a large proportion of young people’s deaths.
Injuries were responsible for 10.5% of all child and young person deaths in 2009, with the main causes due to road traffic accidents and choking among babies, as well as the danger from injuries in the home.
The report card states: “There is a continued need to support and fund injury prevention measures in a combined approach of education, engineering and enforcement of standards and regulations.Englandcurrently has excellent capacity to address child safety and reasonable infrastructure.
“However, stronger leadership from government is required to ensure endorsement and implementation of a national strategy with specific targets for child and adolescent safety that takes into account priority areas and performance gaps, provides financial resources to support co-ordination and infrastructure specific to child and adolescent safety and maintains and enhances existing capacity.”
Sheila Merrill, RoSPA’s public health adviser, said: “AlthoughEnglandis described as one of the safest countries inEurope, we cannot rest on our laurels when injury is still claiming the lives of hundreds of children and young people each year.
“This is a critical time for accident prevention in the context of the reorganisation of public health acrossEngland. We hope the report card and country profile will encourage national-level action on child safety to support and build on the work that is already ongoing across the country, particularly the work undertaken by the public sector at a local level and also by the third sector.”
For more information, visit www.childsafetyeurope.org.
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