Your journey to parenthood is an exciting time that requires much preparation, and also includes staying safe on the road. During pregnancy, mothers-to-be need to continuously make in-vehicle adjustments to ensure optimal positioning and safety while driving.
A common worry during pregnancy is how to buckle up. In this article, we talk about how to wear a seatbelt without fear of there being too much pressure on your stomach and your baby.
Every now and then, the effectiveness of seatbelts and child restrains comes under scrutiny, usually in the form of a tête-à-tête at a braai or similar social gathering.
Recently, I found myself reluctantly drawn into a spirited banter with a visitor from a European country about the use or non-use of restraints in South Africa. Fortunately, it was within a social setting and the gentleman in question – a devotee of Ignition TV – was aware of my feisty personality, which helped take the sting out of most of my commentary, (I hope).
The discussion begun when he commented about the high rate of fatalities in South Africa but, took a sour turn when he proclaimed “seatbelts are not a thing in this country. I retorted by saying that everyone I know uses seatbelts but deep down, I knew that my social circle was not represented in the broad statement he had made.
Being as passionate as I am about road safety and feeling rather patriotic it wasn’t long before we were trading thinly veiled verbal blows about road safety in South Africa; and the flexible standards of quality control when it comes to certain vehicles and tyres which are permitted into our country.
While it may be accurate to say that seatbelts and child restraints usage do not come as second nature to South African road users as in Europe and other parts of the world, we managed to agree that education was a key factor in reducing the number of serious injuries and mortalities on our roads. As part of our efforts to find mutual ground and conclude the heated discussion, I agreed to share more information about seatbelts and child restraints, starting with this article.
The reality in our country is that there are roughly two distinct audiences for seatbelt and child restraints education. One, is familiar with them and appreciates their purpose, largely because they are among the millions of South Africans who own cars and use them daily. The other, is the vast majority of the population who rely on taxies and buses, in which any type of occupant restraints seem to come as an optional extra.
I say this with caution as manufacturers of local commercial people movers do include seatbelts in their vehicles. That said, I am hard-pressed to recall ever stopping at a traffic light and seeing the occupants in a taxi all buckled up.
Seatbelts and child restraints should be seen as a secondary safety devices, created to minimize injury to a person in the event of an accident. Their main purpose is to:
Granted, there are instances where people have reported failure in the mechanics of a seatbelt, particularly the buckle function. In these occurrences, motorists have reportedly been unable to unbuckle them, resulting in an occupant becoming stuck in their seat.
As legitimate as these concerns are, and not to downplay their occurrences, the percentage of seatbelt buckle failure is minuscule compared to the number of times seatbelts and child restraints have played a major role in saving lives and reducing injuries.
There are three types of “collisions” that occur in every accident where occupants of a car are unrestrained.
The first type of collision occurs between the vehicle and another object, e.g. another vehicle(s), a stationary object (tree, signpost, or ditch), or a human or animal. The second, occurs between the unbelted occupants and the interior of the vehicle, e.g. the driver hits her chest against the steering wheel or her head against the window. The third and final type of collision takes place when the internal organs of the body knock against the body’s skeletal structure.
Of the three, it is the second collision that is responsible for most injuries. It is by far, the cause of the most frequent and life-threatening injuries which happen to victims of head-on accidents involving occupants unrestrained by seatbelts. These injuries, in order of importance are, a hit to the head, the chest followed by the abdomen.
Let’s imagine you are driving with 2 other people in the car. As the driver, you habitually buckle up but fail to notice or enforce the use of restraints on your passengers. Perhaps youare under the influence of alcohol, drugs, or medication, or perhaps you are simply in the habit of driving fast because your car has a powerful engine. Whatever the reason, in this scenario let us say you are driving well above the speed limit, at 140km/hr. Suddenly, the vehicle in front of yours comes to dead stop.
As your car ploughs into the stationary vehicle. You, the restrained driver are propelled forward for an unceremonious kissing session with the airbag while the pretensioner of your seatbelt simultaneously tugs at your torso. Your head cracks against the window and bounces off your headrest, assuming of course that the window was closed and the headrest positioned in such a way as to provide the necessary support.
At the same time, the front passenger, flies into the windscreen and is projected out of the car. She bounces off the bonnet before landing on the rear of the preceding vehicle, (because she was unrestrained at point of impact, it is quite possible that she lands intothe vehicle).
Meanwhile, your equally unrestrained back seat passenger crashes into the backrest of the seat in front of her. Her ordeal has only just begun as she proceeds to mimic a tennis ball within the car, catapulting from one side of it to the other, uncontrollably. All this happens in less than a blink of an eye and at the same speed you were driving at. 140km/hr.
People tend to feel extremely pained by the death or serious injury of a toddler. As gory as the image of what happens when an unrestrained adult is involved in an accident, it is much more unfathomable when it happens to infants and here’s my take on why….
When it comes to car safety, toddlers are at the mercy of adults whose responsibility is to ensure their well-being as best they can. When a child is killed or seriously injured in a car accident it is usually as a result of an adult who has shirked the responsibility of bucking them into an appropriate child restraint.
Here’s a short reminder, about just how vulnerable unrestrained toddlers in a car are. At birth, an infant’s head measures approximately a quarter of their total length and it is about a third of their body weight. Their skull is soft and flexible meaning a relatively small impact can result in significant deformation of the skull and brain. Also, their rib cage is not as rigid as that of a grown-up. In a nutshell, it is safe to say that the smaller the child, the smaller the force needed for serious injury.
In the event of an accident, harsh impact to a toddler’s chest can result in a large compression of the chest wall onto the heart and lungs and some of the abdominal organs. And because an infant’s pelvis is fragile, it cannot withstand the forces from an adult restraint system. For this reason, infants require their own special seats designed to cradle them in a crash and provide protection from many types of crashes.
Now, let’s go back to the scenario in which you are driving (securely buckled-up) at 140km/hr. This time though, your 5 year old is lying across the rear seat, sound asleep. Once again an imaginary car comes to a sudden halt and your car collides into it.
At point of impact, your bundle of joy will ricochet within your car like the last jelly bean in the packet; smashing against the roof, doors, windows, and other passengers. Because his head is heavier than the rest of their body, the horrifying series of aerial acrobatics he performs are all head first. Eventually, he explodes from the car and lands, goodness knows where! It could be on the middle of the road, in the path of passing or on-coming traffic, in the nearby bushes, into a body of water or maybe just next to your car. Without question, they will be severely hurt, if at all alive, wherever they land.
As disturbing as these illustrations are, they are real. I have heard many gruesome tales from first responders about what they are confronted with at accident sites. In many instances, first responders talk about how the majority of accidents they are called out to could have been prevented.
The causes of preventable yet fatal accidents in our country relate to:
In my mind, the high fatality rate on our roads is inexcusable particularly when it comes to using seatbelts and child restraints. It should be every driver’s rule that the vehicle will not move until all the occupants within it are safely buckled up, irrespective of the intended distance of travel.
As far as the availability and correct use of restraints as a part of everyday practice in taxies and buses – I can only hope that there will come a time when all vehicles on our roads have them and that the owners of those without, face the heavy arm of the law. It really is high time that seatbelt and child restraint usage in South Africa, became ‘a thing’.
Research credit: Arrive Alive
An air bag can save your life. However, air bags and young children are a dangerous combination.
When used with seat belts, airbags work well to protect teenagers and adults; however, airbags can be very dangerous to children, particularly to those riding in rear-facing seats and to preschoolers and young school-aged children who are not properly restrained.
If your vehicle has a front passenger airbag, infants in rear-facing seats must ride in the back seat. Even in a relatively low-speed crash, the airbag can inflate, strike the car seat, and cause serious brain injury and death.
Vehicles with no back seat or a back seat that is not made for passengers are not the best choice for traveling with small children; however, the airbag can be turned off in some of these vehicles if the front seat is needed for a child passenger. See your vehicle owner’s manual for more information.
Side airbags improve safety for adults in side-impact crashes. Read your vehicle owner’s manual for more information about the airbags in your vehicle. Read your car seat instructions and the vehicle owner’s manual for guidance on placing the seat next to a side airbag.
Source: healtychildren.org (Copyright © 2021 American Academy of Pediatrics)
Safety technology in vehicles can be the difference between life and death. In the majority of instances, however, drivers and passengers need to use this technology in certain ways in order for it to work properly. In fact, if you do not do something as simple as sitting correctly, or wear a seatbelt correctly, it can cause damage to the occupant.
The managing director of MasterDrive, Eugene Herbert, says drivers and passengers who use seatbelts and sit properly, reduce mortality rates in crashes by up to 67%. “This proves the importance of using these safety features correctly. Many people, knowingly and unknowingly, sit in vehicles in ways that not only prevent the safety technology from working as it should but causes additional injuries.”
These are some of the most dangerous ways to sit in a vehicle:
Think carefully about your safety before you slide into your favorite position the next time you get in the car. “Avoid these too common ways of sitting to prevent life-changing injuries or death should you be in a car accident,” says Herbert.
