Spring has only just arrived and the weather is getting warmer, but already in the first few months of 2011 there have been 37 reports of drownings and 38 near-drowning incidents. In light of these alarming numbers and with the summer swimming season just around the corner, the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC) is highlighting water saftey in hopes of saving lives. The agency has launched a public service campaign and provides safety tips at its website, www.PoolSafely.gov.
March is Brain Injury Awareness Month. Each year, millions of people in the United States sustain a Traumatic Brain Injury (TBI) from falls, motor vehicle traffic crashes, collisions with moving or stationary objects, and assaults. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) estimates TBI will affect 1.7 million people, resulting in 1.365 million emergency room visits; 275,000 hospitalizations, and 52,000 deaths every year. In order to bring awareness to brain injury and the lives of those affected by it, March is designated as national Brain Injury Awareness Month.
The holidays, celebrated all over the country with strands of lights and glowing candles, can turn from joy to tragedy in an instant if some key safety measures are overlooked. Grim facts about injuries and deaths are not what consumers want to hear this time of year, but it's important to understand how you may be at risk and what you can do about it.
Concussions in football aren't anything new, but a growing awareness of just how dangerous these seemingly innocuous head injuries can be may change the rules of the game on all levels. Yesterday the National Football League announced that it would immediately begin suspending players for "egregious and elevated hits" that violate games rules, especially those governing helmets.
WASHINGTON, D.C. - The U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC) wants consumers to put safety in play if fireworks are part of Fourth of July celebrations. A new CPSC study indicates that in 2009 there were two deaths and nearly 9,000 emergency room visits for injuries resulting from fireworks related incidents. Most fireworks injuries occurred to consumers younger than 20 and resulted in the loss of a limb in many cases.
The energy industry fought federal regulators, safety advocates, and environmental activists for promoting policies that would enhance the safety of workers and reduce the risk of environmental harm before the massive Deepwater Horizon rig exploded last week and sank into the Gulf of Mexico.
Eleven oil rig workers are still missing after what appeared to be a blowout explosion on a Transocean oil platform in the Gulf of Mexico Tuesday night. Teams of rescue workers continue to search 2,000 square miles of sea around the blast site, covering the area a dozen times by air and 5 times by boat.
Several traffic safety concerns have been triggered in the wake of an accident on a stretch of I-65 in Kentucky that claimed the lives of 11 people - an accident that authorities say is one of the worst traffic accidents in the state's history. The accident occurred when a commercial truck driven by 45-year-old Kenneth Laymon of Alabama left the interstate, plowed through a cable barrier, and struck a van head-on, killing the truck driver and ten people in the van. Two children who were secured in safety seats inside the van survived.
Halloween can become a scary time for all the wrong reasons. Unsafe costumes, walking in the streets, getting candy from strangers... The risks are real, but there are a number of things you can do to keep your trick-or-treaters safe.
"Stay in school" was President Obama's message to the nation's schoolchildren Tuesday as a new academic year opened throughout much of the country. The message was echoed by Inez Tenenbaum, Chairman of the U.S. Consumer Products Safety Commission, as she traveled back to South Carolina, her home state, to meet with students and faculty at a Columbia elementary school. However, Tenenbaum's message to students emphasized staying in school by remaining safety conscious and staying out of the hospital.
