Accidental drowning deaths are down by nine percent since 1999, according to a ten-year report released by the Center for Disease Control on Tuesday.
One of the primary reasons for the report was to track drowning deaths among children ages 1-4, the most likely victim every year since 1999 (and probably also before that). At the time the report first began, drowning was emerging as one of the primary causes of unintentional death among that age group (exchanging the top spot over the years with motor vehicle accidents). Researchers hoped to use the information they gathered to provide advice on prevention programs.
Whatever precautions people have been making over the last 10 years might be advice enough. Though children 1-4 are still the most likely to drown, they're now 17.5 percent less likely to do so. On the same trend down were infants 0-1 (45.6 decrease) and children 5-19 (30.2 decrease). Adults 20-42 maintained the same rate while the 44-85 age group and 85 and over age group were more likely by 14 and 36 percent, respectively. Thus, prevention methods might be most effective if focused on the older section of the population.
For adults, that might include more education about ocean safety. Over half of all drowning deaths for those ages 20-84 occurred in open water, by far the highest percentage of any group. By comparison, the most likely location of death for the 1-4 age group was swimming pools (over 50 percent).
Drowning accounts for seven percent of all injury-related deaths worldwide, and is the third leading cause of death in the category, according to the report.
