Year after year, Americans react with horror when hearing of yet another child who’s been left in a hot car by a parent — with tragic results. How could parents forget their most precious possession — even in the rush of an extremely busy day?
“Ninety percent of the time it is normal, hardworking, upstanding citizens who forget their children in cars,” said one expert.
Most people believe they’d never allow this to happen. But it happens all too easily, and this year already there have been 12 heatstroke fatalities in cars involving children. This is a stunning 275 percent increase compared to this time last year.
In 2015 there were 24 child heatstroke fatalities — and there have been 673 child deaths from heatstroke since 1998, according to noheatstroke.org. The average number of U.S. child heatstroke fatalities per year since 1998 is 37.
“The most important part of the conversation is that this can absolutely happen to anyone,” Janette Fennell, founder and president of KidsandCars.org, told LifeZette. “I can’t stress it enough. The biggest mistake that anyone can ever make is to think that this can’t happen to them — or someone in their family.”
If you carry that false sense of invulnerability, said Fennell, simple yet effective safety strategies won’t be put into place by your family and your caregivers.
Tricia Morrow, a General Motors engineer and the mother of two girls, ages 12 and 6, echoed Fennell’s thoughts. Morrow is part of the GM development team that this week rolled out an industry-first rear seat reminder in its 2017 Acadia automobile.
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“As a parent, I’ve heard a lot of feedback on this new rear seat reminder feature. Many say, ‘Wow, who leaves their kids in the back of the car?'” Morrow said. “As someone who both looks at the statistics of heatstroke in cars and leads a very busy life, with things changing by the hour and even by the minute, I can say that this tragedy can happen to anyone. For just that one moment you’re focused on something else, or maybe a change of routine occurs. It’s my worst nightmare — and I can’t imagine leaving my kids in the car. But what I can’t imagine more? The overwhelming grief I would have for the rest of my life.”
Leaving a vulnerable infant or child in a hot car happens in part because our brains work a certain way, said Fennell.
“Put your cell phone, your employee badge, and your computer on the floorboard in the backseat in front of your child. We encourage the cell phone because then you can’t make calls or text on it while driving.”
“Our brains don’t work as well when we’re exhausted, are under stress, or have changes in our normal routine,” she said. “The pre-frontal cortex holds our prospective memory. It makes our lists for us — ‘I’ve got to go to work, then attend a meeting, then a lunch date’ — thoughts like that. We also have the basal ganglia portion of the brain, the old, strongest, and almost primitive part of our brain. Some refer to the basal ganglia as ‘autopilot.’
“When we get up in the morning,” she continued, “we don’t think, ‘I’ve got to start breathing.’ It’s just that strong, So if there’s a fight between the basal ganglia and the pre-frontal cortex, the ganglia always wins. When a normal routine is changed, like a dad is dropping off a baby at daycare instead of the mom, and maybe Dad has been up all night with baby, or thinking about job — he falls into this ‘autopilot.'”
The baby in the backseat has fallen asleep in this scenario, and isn’t making a sound. Tragedy can then ensue — even for the most caring of parents.
“Ninety percent of the time it is normal, hardworking, upstanding citizens who forget their children in cars,” said Fennell. “Most people think it’s people involved with drugs, alcohol — or children’s protective services. In fact, it’s not these parents. They are involved in only about 10 percent of these deaths.”
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Morrow says that GM has been seeking technology that could handle the task for years, but as statistics continued to climb, so did the company’s resolve.
“It was quickly becoming unbearable — our worries and our customers’ worries. So as a team we began working feverishly, and had a pretty quick turnaround on this feature.”
Fennell’s organization is happy about the new Acadia feature, and hopes to see more like it. “Babies are totally helpless in cars,” she said. “We’re calling on all automakers to have this type of feature, and we’re also asking GM to put it in all their cars, too.”
Thirty percent of heatstroke fatalities are children who climb into vehicles and get tired or dizzy and fall asleep.
Said Morrow, “I hope we’re copied! It’s not a GM issue. It’s an industry issue.”
KidsandCars.org works with families who have lost a child to heatstroke in the back of a car. “We’re very close with them,” said Fennell. “I think about a quote from one of the moms we worked with. She said, ‘If there just would have been this one little thing [some sort of rear seat reminder], it would have taken me out of my fog.’”
How does the GM feature work? “If you have opened your rear doors before driving, when you turn your car off you’ll hear five distinct chimes, and they’re different from your buckle-up chimes,” said Morrow. “It’s trying to capture your attention. Then there’s the visual reminder, which reads, ‘Look In Rear Seat.’ It makes you take a quick look. It could be your laptop, your lunch — or your child.”
There are other strategies parents and caregivers can employ to fight their brain’s autopilot.
Put your cell phone, your employee badge, and your computer on the floorboard in the backseat in front of your child, advises Fennell. “We encourage the cell phone because then you can’t make calls or text on it while driving,” she said. “People have even told us they put their left shoe back there — you can’t get anywhere without that.”
Fennell also advocates for making childcare providers key to infant and car safety. Just as schools have an absentee verification line to connect with parents over absences, daycares should do this as well, she said.
“The first time I was made aware of this [absentee line] in schools, I thought, ‘Bingo!’ Daycares should do this too. It’s the parents’ responsibility ultimately, but daycares are being paid for a service. They are paid for how many little bodies are in their seats, so it should be their responsibility, too.”
Morrow said it’s not just parents who are forgetful — grandparents forget, too. And 30 percent of heatstroke fatalities are children who climb into vehicles and get tired or dizzy and fall asleep.
“Keep keys out of reach, and don’t let kids play in cars,” she said. “Kids’ body temperatures rise 3 to 5 times more quickly than an adult’s does. A car heats up fast and a child body heats up fast — it’s a perfect storm for tragedy.”
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