Fed: Summer holiday most hazardous time of the year: Experts

AAP General News (Australia)
12-18-2008
Fed: Summer holiday most hazardous time of the year: Experts

By Danny Rose, Medical Writer

SYDNEY, Dec 18 AAP - Summer is the most hazardous time of the year, say researchers,
with Australians up to three times more likely to be injured or killed.

Water-related risks escalate as hot weather drives many families to the beach or public
pools, often via busy roads or highways .... at a time when alcohol and drug use are up.

"Together they make up a formidable amount of injury in Australia during summer," Professor
Paul Barach, director of the University of NSW's Injury Risk Management Research Centre,
says.

"And they are directly related to having more time, perhaps more discretional income,
and not having enough oversight."

The number of people killed or seriously injured in vehicle crashes on Australia's
roads was 4,000 - 5,000 a year, Prof Barach said, with holiday periods the worst.

The warmer weather also posed other menaces from bushfires to poisonous snakes and spiders.

And closer to home there were other dangers from ladder falls, burns and bicycle crashes
right through to "couch potato" injuries, Prof Barach said.

"(These are) repetitive injuries caused by watching too much TV and having a neck strain
... or playing Nintendo and video games, which can cause carpel tunnel syndrome," he said.

"The number of injuries that we have in Australia in the summer tends to be two to
three times more than we have at equivalent times outside of summer - so it is a high-risk
time."

Beach expert Dr Rob Brander said a drowning occurred, on average, every two to three
days of summer - and up to 70 per cent of drowning deaths and 90 per cent of beach rescues
involved a rip.

Despite this, a study involving almost 400 Australian beachgoers showed 60 per cent
could not spot a rip when shown a photograph that included one.

Dr Brander - senior lecturer at the University of NSW's School of Biological, Earth
and Environmental Sciences - said rips were commonplace at Australia's beaches yet the
risks were largely ignored by the public.

"If it was shark attack there would be mass hysteria but that doesn't happen with rips," he said.

"Its a fundamental problem that most Australians don't know how to spot a rip."

Dr Anthony Shakeshaft, of the National Drug and Alcohol Research Centre (NDARC), said
alcohol also played an exacerbating role in all of the other known summer-related risk
factors.

Alcohol-related crime also increased during the summer months - particularly assaults
and malicious damage - and this was because "more people are drinking, and drinking in
public places".

"People going fishing, swimming, boating, whatever it is, because they are not at work
they might be drinking during the day, so any potential for them to get into strife gets
exacerbated," Dr Shakeshaft said.

AAP dr/it/bwl

KEYWORD: SUMMER (WITH FACTBOXES, GRAPHIC)

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