PETITION Prevent Child Heat Stroke Deaths in Vehicles
Cars come equipped with alarms that remind motorists to buckle their seatbelts, chimes that indicate headlights are still on after the engine is turned off and buzzers that sound if keys are left in the ignition, says Janette Fennell. Forget a sleeping child in the rear seats, however, and drivers are on their own.
Fennell, founder and president of Kids and Cars, a nonprofit organization that advocates for children's traffic safety, is trying to change that. The group filed a petition Monday with the White House, asking the federal government to provide funds for research and development of technology that can detect a child left in the rear seat of a vehicle. An average of 38 children die each year in the United States from vehicular heatstroke. More than half of the deaths occur after parents inadvertently leave children in the car. So far in 2014, there have been 17 such deaths in the US, according to Kids and Cars. The most recent came last week in Ridgefield, CT, and July is historically the month when vehicular-heatstroke deaths are most likely to occur. (Story by Autoblog)
https://petitions.whitehouse.gov/petition/prevent-child-heat-stroke-deaths-vehicles/ymQR1Ty0