Already have an account?
Get back to the
Entertainment

Two Children Are Injured Each Day by Window Blinds, Study Finds

Tags:

Window blinds may seem like a harmless household accessory as well as a necessity — if you want any type of privacy, that is. But a new study published in the American Academy of Pediatrics claims window blinds are actually quite dangerous, causing two child injuries per day and one child death per month. According to the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC), approximately 200 children have lost their lives due to strangulation from window treatment cords.

How to Child-Proof Window Treatments

Nothing is more important than the safety of your little ones. Prevent injury by making your window treatments child-proof with these helpful tips.

1. Keep cribs and other furniture away from the window. Don’t overestimate the strength of a child guard — or a window guard, for that matter. Children are curious, which means they’ll do whatever they have to do to see what’s going on. Children who are able to crawl and walk will climb on top of furniture to get onto a window sill, only to find that they can’t get down, leaving the cord as their only escape option.

2. Make sure all cords are out of reach.

Regardless of how “safe” you think a window treatment is, the cords should be kept out of reach. A good way to secure window cords is to wrap the cord around a cleat.

3. Go cordless.

Cordless blinds are the safest solution to keep your kids out of danger and will give you the peace of mind you need to allow your child to play unsupervised.

Almost all entanglements occurred at home.

According to the study, more than 17,000 children were treated for window-blind related injuries between 1990 and 2015. Results of the study stemmed from data collected from two national databases. While most injuries were minor, entanglement accounted for 11.9 percent of all cases and was associated with 80 percent of 726 hospitalizations and more than 94 percent of 271 window-related child deaths.

In 2014, Parents for Window Blind Safety published a heart-wrenching PSA video entitled “In an Instant” in which actors reenacted how dangerous window-blinds can be.

“There are just a lot of people out there [with a] misconception of how these accidents occur,” Linda Faiser, founder of Parents for Window Blind Safety, told Parents. “We’re trying to bring to life how fast they occur — the fact that they can occur in the same room with a parent.”

See Kaiser’s emotional PSA in the video below:

Remember to be vigilant: After all, nothing is more important than your little ones’ safety.

More from FIRST

What I Wished I’d Known Before My Child Started School

In Defense of Caring Less About Your Second Child

The Real Reason Your Child Cried at Night Is Brutally Funny

Use left and right arrow keys to navigate between menu items. Use right arrow key to move into submenus. Use escape to exit the menu. Use up and down arrow keys to explore. Use left arrow key to move back to the parent list.