Why children drown - review article

Conclusions: children drown because: of heightened risk in the environment; acute triggers operate to enable a child to get into the water unsupervised; he cannot swim and no help is near; a march of linked events starts in the oxygen-starved tissues; rescue and resuscitation are unskilled or too late; and the period of oxygen deprivation is too long to prevent brain death. A reductio in the child-drowning rate can be achieved by the prevention of any one or more of these points.