21st ANNUAL BURN AWARENESS WEEK
February 5th to 11th
The BC Professional Fire Fighters’ Burn Fund’s 21st Annual Burn Awareness Week (BAW) program runs February 5th to 11th 2017.
Burn Awareness Week teaches kids to be responsible for their own safety, and helps make their families aware of potentially harmful situations. All Burn Awareness Week resources and curriculum are available online at burnfund.org
To encourage student participation, the Burn Fund runs the annual Burn Awareness Week Poster Contest. Every entrant receives a participation prize and fifty students will win money for their elementary school or BC Ministry of Education sanctioned distance education facility. There are seven regional prizes, including a $1,000 Grand prize and six $500 Regional prizes. Regions are the Lower Mainland (three winners), Vancouver Island, Kootenays, Northern BC and the Okanagan (one winner for each area). Forty-three students win runner-up prizes of $50 each for their school or distance education facility. Complete prize details, rules and regulations are available online.
Burn Awareness Week Program
Public and private elementary schools in British Columbia, parents, students – anyone – can access the program online, which includes burn awareness safety tip information, student activity sheets, quizzes, coloring pages, and animated videos. The program is available in PDF format for easy download and printing.
Educational, fun and interactive, the program includes age-appropriate safety lessons intended for K/Grade 1; Grade 2/3; Grade 4/5; and Grade 6/7.
The Burn Hazard
A majority of Canadian parents aren’t aware of the scald and burn hazards in their homes. A survey by Safe Kids Canada found that 70 per cent of Canadian parents did not know that the most common cause of burn injuries to children is scalds from hot liquids, such as spilled hot drinks and hot tap water, rather than fire.
“Most adults realize that children need to be kept safe from fire or hot objects like the stove, but they do not realize that hot liquids are just as dangerous,” says Jason Milne, Burn Fund Director and Chair of the Burn Awareness Week Program. “Hot liquids burn just like fire.”
Each year, BC Children’s Hospital cares for as many as 280 children who have suffered a burn and over 550 hospital visits are required following the initial injury, for burn treatment and re-constructive surgery. The treatment is painful and prolonged, often resulting in long term consequences for the children such as disgurement, physical disability and emotional dysfunction.
The common sources of burns to young children are scalds from hot drinks or tap water. Contact burns from ovens or gas fireplaces are also frequently seen in this age group. Because’s a child’s skin in thinner than an adults, skin damage occurs quickly and at a lower temperature.
Get involved in the conversation, follow us on Facebook or Twitter for more prevention tips and BAW information.
