Kokua Line: Long-term records of hot-car deaths include 6 Hawaii children, group says

Question: The news keeps having these terrible stories about babies dying in cars because somebody forgot them all day. Is this getting worse? I don’t remember hearing so much about it before. Maybe I am noticing now because I have grandkids.

Answer: Yes, the number of kids dying in hot cars is rising nationwide, according to KidsAndCars.org, a nonprofit organization devoted to saving young children from harm in and around vehicles. Nationwide, 53 children died of vehicular heatstroke in 2018, the worst year on record, the group said; 43 died in 2017 and 39 in 2016, it said.

So far this year, 35 children have died, it said, including the children you remembered from the TV news (1-year-old twins who died in New York in July).

The group has documented 922 vehicular heatstroke fatalities of children younger than 14 (88% were age 3 or younger) from 1990 through Aug. 16, 2019. Six of those deaths occurred in Hawaii, between 1996 and 2014, it said.

The organization says that the number of deaths it has recorded “should be considered an undercount of the actual number of child vehicular heatstroke fatalities due to no official state data collection systems.”

In most cases (56%), parents or caregivers forgot that the child was in the car, commonly because an infant was sleeping quietly in a rear-facing safety seat. A baby overheats three to five times faster than an adult, the group says, and the temperature inside a car can reach 125 degrees in minutes.

The advocacy group emphasizes that this tragedy could befall any family. Sleep deprivation and a change in routine (both common among new parents) coupled with minor distractions contribute to “auto-pilot” brain function, and can result, for example, in a parent driving straight to work and forgetting to drop off the kids at day care between home and the office.

The group offers numerous prevention tips at 808ne.ws/tips, such as placing an essential item — such as a cellphone, employee badge or office key card — on the back seat next to the car seat as a way to remember that item and the child. More broadly, it’s pushing for passage of a federal law that would require automakers to install passenger-detection alert systems in new cars.

The risk of this happening is higher during busy times, schedule changes, holidays and periods of crisis. “The most dangerous mistake a parent or caregiver can make is to think leaving a child alone in a vehicle could never happen to them or their family,” the group states on its website.

Auwe

On Friday I finished picking up my mail from the McCully Post Office. I was ready to pull out, when a white compact car double-parked in front of me. A young male got out of the car and ran into the post office. A young female stayed behind. I popped my horn. She mouthed, “I’m waiting.” I popped my horn again, I pointed to the right and mouthed, “Get out of my way!” She waited a few seconds. I was about to get out of my car when she finally moved. Have people become so self-centered, oblivious and inconsiderate that they don’t realize they are inconveniencing others. Is society heading this way? Unbelievable! — Signed, Shaking my head

Mahalo

I have hope for the world because of the nice young people who help me through my daily routine. A neighborhood boy helps me move my garbage bins. A young girl down the block puts the newspaper at my door (from the driveway). On Friday I was waiting fruitlessly for the bus when another youngster called out, “Auntie! Holiday schedule!” (I had forgotten). Fine teenagers all, and I am lucky to know them. — Kupuna

Write to Kokua Line at Honolulu Star-Advertiser, 7 Waterfront Plaza, Suite 210, 500 Ala Moana Blvd., Honolulu 96813; call 529-4773; fax 529-4750; or email kokualine@staradvertiser.com.