Ms Nane Annan visits UNICEF's Beijing Child Injury Prevention Project
“We all need to make sure children grow up in safe environments” BEIJING, 23 May 2006. Ms Nane Annan , who is with the UN Secretary-General on a 5-day visit to China, yesterday visited a kindergarten and a primary school participating in UNICEF's pilot Beijing Child Injury Prevention Project. At a kindergarten adjoining the Ligong University campus, she first saw children aged 5-6 playing games designed to draw their attention to hazards in the environment at school and at home. Ms Annan visibly enjoyed her animated discussions with the kindergarten children who showed her their drawings and other materials on the prevention of drowning, traffic accidents and falls created under the project. The teachers then proudly showed Ms Annan how the school's windows and washroom facilities had been re-designed with the safety of the school's 288 children in mind.
The Beijing Child Injury Project is a new project in UNICEF China's 2006-2010 Country Programme and responds to a disturbing reality. Although under-five mortality rates in China have been steadily declining over the past ten years, child injury has become the leading cause of death for children over one. Injuries also result in morbidity and disabilities which are an emotional and economic burden on families and society. The Beijing Injury Survey supported by UNICEF and The Alliance For Safe Children (TASC) revealed that in 2003 there were over 50,000 children injured in Beijing. Each day, 39 serious cases receiving medical care or hospitalization or resulting in death. The leading causes of fatal injury were drowning and road traffic, while falls, animal bites and road traffic were the leading causes of non-fatal injury.
The primary aim of the Beijing pilot project is to raise the awareness of children, parents, teachers and society at large about how child injury can be prevented, equipping them with knowledge and skills to identify risk of injury, and practice protective behaviour. The project also works with parents and teachers to remove hazards from the school and home and also develop policies and standards for child safety. The UNICEF pilot project in Beijing has been developed in partnership with the Alliance for Safe Children (TASC), the Ministries of Health and Education, the National and Beijing Working Committees on Women and Children (NWCCW and BWCCW)) and the Beijing Municipal Government.
Moving on to a nearby primary school also participating in the project, Ms Annan encountered an empty playground which in just 90 seconds filled with 500 children evacuating the building in a fire drill. Ms Annan then sat-in a safety class where children learn practical skills on preventing drowning, road traffic accident, fire, animal bites, falls and other injures, using the school teacher's training manual developed by the project. Yesterday's class was on how to deal with fire outbreaks in the home as well as demonstrating how to leave safely from a smoke-filled building. Ms. Annan playfully joined the class and told the children how they themselves were the best reason why they should be protected and how it was the duty of teachers, parents and all of society to help make sure they grew up in safe environments.
The Beijing Child Injury Prevention Project has proved enormously popular with government policy makers, teachers, parents and the children themselves. UNICEF is hoping to mobilize further resources to expand the project to other parts of the Beijing and to rural provinces where child injury has a greater impact on the lives and development potentials of China's children. .The project also opens up an opportunity to create a Safe Beijing that links up with the 2008 Beijing Olympics Ms Annan and the Secretary-General are to end their China visit later yesterday.
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