In anticipation of the swimming season, the CPSC and the American Academy of Pediatrics have issued their annual pool-safety tips. We’d like to add one to the list: Don’t buy an inflatable pool unless you plan to empty it immediately after each use.
Large inflatable pools can hold thousands of gallons of water and often lack the surrounding layers of protection—gates, fences, removable ladders—required to enhance pool safety. In addition, the soft sides make it all too easy for a curious toddler to topple in.
According to Carol Pollack Nelson, an independent safety consultant who closely follows the safety of inflatable pools, 209 drowning incidents associated with inflatable pools were reported to the CPSC from 2001 through 2009. The majority (94 percent) involved children younger than five.The problem is often related to the lack of barriers around the pool. According to the AAP, most young children who drown in pools wander out of the house and fall in. Consumers who pay only $75 for a large inflatable pool are not apt to spend ten times that amount on a proper fence to surround it. And there are no reliable pool alarms or safety covers for inflatable pools. Most municipalities require fences around swimming pools, but when set up in the back yard, inflatable pools can go unseen by enforcement agents.
All in all, a bad way to stay cool.
--Don Mays
I wonder if the hazard is parents that do not pay attention to the children a little more diligently when a pool is setup. Do we know if the inflatable pools being referred to are the "kiddie pool" sized pools? If the enforcement officer really wants to find the pool, he can't miss a pool setup anywhere at a house.
Blaming the pool for the deaths and near-deaths is like blaming guns for killing people, bogus!
Inattentive parents are the hazard, not the pools.
While on vacation last summer my wife and our four kids (ages 7, 5, 3, and 1) were swimming in the hotel pool. During a 20 minute period, we had to fish three of the four out of the pool after they wandered a little too far out. They were all fine and the most they got was a little dunk, but the scariest part was there was no sound. No splashing, no screaming, no calling for help. Just a little kid struggling to get to the surface. My wife and I were both in the water with them and we fished them out quickly and they were back in the pool after they caught their breath, but if we had been chatting with one another, or reading a book, or even let our attention wander for just a minute, it could have been catastrophic. They could have drowned while both of us were less than three feet from them. Tales of kids drowning in pools are way too common and I can totally see how easy it is to happen.
Hello, I would like to respond to the article about outdoor swimming pools, inflatable swimming pools and all the dangers of the same.
I invented the water ball in 1998 a transparent ball with a zipper that is used in over 140 countries world wide for allowing people to have their first experience of trying to walk on the water .
That being said, we have a lot of experience in using, selling and promoting our particular sport of water walking with the water ball.
first of all pools can be purchased with covers for when the swimming pools are not being used.
the person in the video announced that children cannot read warning labels .
We have been putting people inside giant 2m 6.5ft balls for over 13 years and have never had a reported accident of any kind. We also send safety information and give step by step instructions along with our inflatable swimming pools so accidents will only happen to those adults in charge who are careless and do not keep an eye on their kids. Our water balls require that there are at least 2 people working them , as you need one person to blow up the ball and the other one is inside the ball trying to walk on the water. Also the article that states to watch out for low priced swimming pools is kind of misleading as the swimming pool is not at fault here but the people using the swimming pool. if you were to mention that the swimming pool had burst causing the death of the child , well that would be something for me to worry about , but instead whoever wrote this article, must have decided they might get more attention by making the swimming pool itself the deadly object . The report about the child that drown had nothing to do with the swimming pool.
It seems that if a kid falls down and hits his head on a rock and get hurt, then whole world wants to condemn rocks from the face of the earth.
Safe use of products and the teaching of how to use products is the personal responsibility of every company that is concerned about product safety.
The problem is to produce the instructions in a way that the consumer must read them , like on the inflatable swimming pool for example. I think the company that produces the swimming pool has made an effort to put the instructions right in your face so to speak . Soon we will come up with products that will speak and tell you how their used every time you touch a special button. If no one pushes the button however, the message will never be delivered to the consumer.
We can only provide the instuctions and make them as evident as possible. but we cannot make anyone push the button to listen.
Read carefully all the instructions that come with your new product, whatever it is and then do not take the instuctions lightly as someone you love may count on you, to be the one who can read the safety instructions as that is not the responsibility of children but of those who watch over them.
I think that I can honestly speak as an expert on inflatable swimming pools and honestly say that they are not dangerous, at all, when used under adult supervision.
Its a good idea, to cover your pool not only for safety but also to keep the mosquito population under control in your back yard.
Charles Jones ,Italy
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