Cars Should Not Be Death Traps For Children

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From Dr Amar-Singh HSS, Dr See Kwee Ching, Dr S Selva Kumar and Dr Krishnan Rajam
This is an open appeal to all car manufacturers in Malaysia – Perodua, Proton, Honda, Toyota, Mitsubishi, Mazda, Nissan and the rest.
We have seen three deaths of children in cars due to thermal injury in the past four to five weeks. On Oct 5, an eight-month-old baby died in Cheras, Kuala Lumpur; on Oct 25, a 16-month-old child died in Terengganu; and on Nov 8, a two-year-old child died in Ara Damansara, Petaling Jaya.
The devastation the parents must be experiencing is beyond comprehension. Our hearts go out to the bereaved parents, and we hope they receive the support and understanding needed in such tragic times of loss.
As paediatricians, we are distressed by such child deaths as we know they are preventable. We need to view this as a national crisis and work together to prevent further deaths. A number of mechanisms have been suggested to help with prevention.
Of the suggestions, the most effective is engineering – using technology to make cars safer for children. Many car manufacturers overseas have long incorporated routine safety devices in their vehicles. These include:
Car seats with built-in sensors or alarms. These let the driver know through a series of alarms that a child is still in the seat when the car is turned off. There are also sensor devices that can be added to a car seat and child safety seats with heat sensors and alarms.Rear seat reminder system. This gives the driver a routine audio reminder to check the rear of the car when the engine is switched off, or when the driver’s door is opened.Child presence detector and cabin awareness systems. These are video or sensor-based systems designed to sense micro-movements, heartbeats, or breathing when the car is turned off and alert the driver via an alarm or handphone alert.Another simple way is to instal seat belt alarms for rear seat passengers that set off once the car switches off and the belt buckles are still connected. The technology is already present in many cars, and just needs to be incorporated into the rear seat belts.
While increased parental, childcare provider and societal vigilance is needed, it will not prevent many such deaths. We require mechanisms that go beyond human behaviour. Injury prevention research has shown that education and behavioural change are poor mechanisms for prevention. Artificial intelligence or hybrid intelligence is the way forward.
Hence, we appeal to all car manufacturers to urgently put in place routine child safety technology in all new cars, if not already installed.
The most promising technologies are rear seat reminders, seat belt alarms and child presence detectors. In addition, they can offer at reasonable prices to retrofit such technologies in all cars already on the road when they come for routine service inspections.
Car manufacturers have made a large profit from the public. It is time to give back. Please do not allow this deadly trend to continue by inaction. Cars must be safe to transport children and shouldn’t be death traps. - FMT
Dr Amar-Singh HSS, Dr See Kwee Ching, Dr S Selva Kumar and Dr Krishnan Rajam are consultant paediatricians.
The views expressed are those of the writers and do not necessarily reflect those of MMKtT.

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