How To Avoid The Hazards of Summer
21 Apr 2008
A West African Proverb says, "There is only one kind of common sense and 40 varieties of lunacy". Every summer proves the Africans are right. Needless injuries and deaths occur primarily because people have momentary relapses of good old-fashioned horse sense.
Dr. David Bishai at Johns Hopkins reports in Annals of Emergency Medicine that an 11 year old ballet student who lost her foot. She had fallen off a power lawn mower while having fun cutting the grass.
Shriners Hospitals say that 275,000 people every year are treated in emergency rooms due to lawn mower and garden tools accidents. 35,000 of these injuries involve children under 15 years of age who lose hands, legs or their lives. These are accidents waiting to happen when young children operate power mowers.
The kinetic energy imparted by the rotating blade is equal to the energy generated by dropping a 21 pound weight from a height of 100 feet. Or three times the muzzle energy of a 357 Magnum pistol. These rotating blades can fire a rock on the grass at people standing nearby at speeds of 100 miles an hour.
There’s an iron-clad rule that hands should never be used to unclog blades, yet every year people do it. Remember that even with the motor turned off the blade remains engaged. The only safe approach is to remove the spark plug before examining the blade.
Other injuries occur when a lawnmower rolls over on a sloping lawn, or operators cut grass in their bare feet, or allow others to ride along with them. And some, after too many cooling beers, get careless.
It’s estimated that this summer another 20,000 North Americans will have water skiing accidents. Half the skiers will hit another boat, 12 per cent will strike the dock or shore, 5 per cent will strike a floating object and 6 per cent will be injured by their boat’s propeller. Some will end up paralyzed or dead. And many victims are unsupervised children.
It’s unbelievable, but every year 1400 children drown in wading pools! This simply could not happen if parents were watching every minute of the time.
Another horrendous error is made by young people who are at one moment paragons of health. A few seconds later they are more helpless than a two-year old child, totally paralyzed from the neck down. They’ve dived into a wheelchair for the rest of their lives.
Year after year in North America there are 13,000 diving accidents and about 800 involve spinal cord injuries. Broken their necks are the result of diving into a shallow pool. Or vertebra are snapped when heads strike hidden rocks in a lake. Victims forgot the basic rule that whenever plunging into unknown waters it always "first time feet first".
A game of tennis is a supposedly safe sport. But players forget tennis balls can strike the eye at speeds of over 200 kilometers an hour (120 mph). This can cause massive hemorrhage, a torn detached retina and sometimes loss of an eye.
To prevent these injuries players must rid themselves of pride and common misconceptions. Many people believe that plastic lenses won’t break. Others mistakenly think that lenses with hardened glass are safe, or an open eye guard is adequate. All these provide a false sense of security. The only good protection is a closed eye guard.
This golfing season some players will be lifted off the ground by lightning that delivers 100 million volts of electricity. The shock will cause ruptured eardrums, retinal detachment, cataract, nerve injuries, kill adults and unborn babies.
If golfers are caught in an electrical storm they should walk back to the clubhouse separately and stop holding the golf club. Women should take metal objects out of their hair. And, if the hair stands on end or the skin tingles, drop to the ground immediately. Lightning may be about to strike. You may then live to play golf another day.
This summer let’s decrease the number of lunatic acts, use more horse sense and prove the Africans are not always right.
