Back seats of cars a bad fit for children
Sydney Morning Herald
Saturday October 17, 2009
CHILDREN aged up to 12 should be made to sit in booster seats because the back seats in most Australian cars are too deep for sitting up properly, making them seven times more likely than teenagers to sustain spinal and abdominal injuries in a crash.Researchers at the Prince of Wales Medical Research Institute tested 50 common cars and found some had seats so deep that a 14-year-old of average height could not sit comfortably without slouching.[Slouching] causes the lap belt to slide up over their abdomen (instead of sitting low across the hip bones) and the shoulder belt to lie across the neck," Lynne Bilston from the institute said yesterday.This can put all the force of a crash on the child's soft abdomen and lower spine and allow the head to hit the car. Having the belt across the neck can cause serious neck injuries.She is calling on car makers to consider urgently reducing the depth of back seats by at least five centimetres, a change that would fit about 34 per cent more children aged eight to 15 but also allow adults to sit comfortably.An average 12-year-old, at 150 centimetres tall, had thighs longer than the base of the rear seat and was tall enough to allow the shoulder belt fitted properly in more than half of the cars measured, she said."Car manufacturers have slow design cycles, so if this change was made it would be three or four years before we would see it introduced, but it would definitely reduce spinal and abdominal injuries and save lives."About 60 per cent of all back seat passengers are children, and more than 3000 are injured in car accidents each year.Associate Professor Bilston said older children would accept being in booster seats if it became normal practice. "It's all about peer pressure. It's common practice now in Europe."
© 2009 Sydney Morning Herald
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