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As a result of the seventh area drowning of a child younger than four-years-old, the Volusia County Health Department has started a campaign to spread awareness about pool safety and the dangers of drowning. Alejandro Guzman, two-years-old was found underwater in a hotel pool at the Oceanside Inn, located at: 1909 S. Atlantic Ave, Daytona Beach Shores. A surveillance video showed that the toddler was underwater for nine minutes before he was noticed.
The Volusia County Health Department has recruited the help form local hotels to spread the message that children need to be supervised at all times around water. A hotel representative agreed to distribute pamphlets about pool safety to local hotels. Stefany Strong, a Health Department spokeswoman, said that the hotels will have the option to distribute the pamphlets with registration forms or put them out on display.
The number of children who have drowned this year has already doubled from last year. The Health Department Chief, Dr. Bonnie Sorensen does not think that people understand how closely they should watch children around the water. ‘They don’t realize how silently and quickly a child can sink in the pool and be gone. When they drown, they don’t scream and yell for help — there’s not a lot of drama,’ she said.
The chief executive officer of the Hotel & Lodging Association of Volusia County, Bob Davis, is unsure how effective the pamphlets will be, but he thinks that there is a chance they could save a life. For more information on this topic, see Hotels to hand out child pool-safety messages.