NORMAN — August was a record month for child deaths in hot cars. In the United States, at least 41 deaths were reported in August, making it higher than any previous month. Temperatures were relatively high throughout much of the nation but it doesn’t take a lot of heat to turn the inside of a vehicle into an oven for a child strapped in a safety seat.
Consumer safety advocates are pushing for legislation requiring driver-reminder chimes for kids in cars to be included in upcoming highway legislation. If you can require reminder systems for seat belts, why not one that reminds you if a child remains buckled into a safety seat after the car is locked.
USA Today reports several manufacturers have made attempts at car-seat alarms. GM has considered a type of alarm that warns drivers when a child is in the back seat, including an alarm that sounds when the inside of a car gets dangerously hot and a person is still inside.
The science is inexact, GM says. Detecting heartbeats or weights is not as easy as it sounds. Alarms could go off warning drivers at the wrong time or parents could get dependent on them and not pay enough attention to the whereabouts of their children. Also, systems that alert parents children are still in cars aren’t necessarily warning about a dangerous situation. Parents may get tired of hearing that and disconnect systems.
Distracted parents are partly to blame. In more than half of the deaths between 1998 and 2009, children were forgotten in parked cars. But there’s another side to the problem. In 30 percent of the deaths, kids were playing in unattended vehicles. Another 18 percent were intentionally left in cars.
Lights and alarms warn us about low fuel, low tire pressure and that it’s time for a checkup. It seems logical they could also remind us if someone is left inside when we lock the car.
