Safe Kids Southern New Jersey will be conducting a car seat checkup event on Wednesday, May 18 at AAA South Jersey headquarters, 700 Laurel Oak Road in Voorhees. It is being held between 10 a.m. and 1 p.m. The event is free and open to the public. No advance sign up is required.
Data released by Safe Kids shows that child safety seats and safety belts, when installed and used properly, can prevent injuries and save lives. Each year, an estimated 975 child occupants under 14 years of age die as a result of a motor vehicle incident. Young children restrained in child safety seats have an 80 percent lower risk of fatal injury than those who are unrestrained.
In a study observing the misuse of 3,442 child restraint systems (CRS) in six states, approximately 73 percent of CRSs showed at least one critical misuse. The most common form of misuses for all CRSs included loose vehicle seat belt attachment to the CRS and loose harness straps securing the child to the CRSs.
A properly installed child safety seat reduces fatal injury in passenger cars by 71 percent for infants less than 1 year old and by 54 percent for toddlers 1 to 4 years of age. For children 4 to 7 years of age, booster seats have shown to reduce injury risk by 59 percent compared to safety belts alone. Additionally, among children under 5 years of age, 451 lives were saved in 2004 due to child restraint use. Of these 451 lives saved, the use of child safety seats was responsible for 413 saved lives and the use of safety belts saved 38 lives.
