Your child’s safety is your responsibility. The following series aims at providing tips to help you keep your baby out of harm from various situations & harms.
Baby Crawling and Walking Safety
When your baby becomes mobile, here are important tips to keep your baby safe around your home:
- Put electrical outlet covers on all outlets.
- Secure electrical cords to baseboards.
- Install safety gates securely in front of stairs and basement doors. Avoid gates with diamond-shaped slats, which provide footholds for climbing toddlers. Instead, use gates with straight, vertical slats and a swinging door.
- Store cleaners and medications out of reach and in a locked cabinet. Never store toxic substances in bottles or jars that could be mistaken for food products.
- If there is a swimming pool in your backyard or your neighborhood, make sure it is surrounded by a fence and has a gate that latches or locks. Better yet, never leave your child unattended when outdoors.
- Keep your child away from moving machinery, including lawn mowers, overhead garage doors. Also keep kids away from driveways and streets.
- Going outside? Keep your baby in the shade, if possible. Their skin is thinner and more sensitive. Cover them up with clothes and a hat, limit their time in the sun (especially between 10 a.m. and 2 p.m., when the sun is strongest), don’t let them get overheated, and get them out of the sun right away if they show any signs of sunburn or dehydration, including fussiness, redness, and excessive crying.
- Install safety locks on cabinets.
- Turn pot and pan handles on the stove in and cook on the back burners whenever possible.
- Establish the area in front of the stove as off limits while you are cooking.
- Keep the toilet lid down to prevent drowning and to keep the lid from slamming on your baby’s head or hands.
- Consider installing toilet lid locks.
- Cushion hard edges and sharp corners of furniture. If possible, move sharp-edged pieces of furniture away from high traffic areas.
- Anchor down unsteady pieces of furniture, such as bookcases.