State Police to Participate in Child Passenger Safety Week

SOUTH CHARLESTON – The week of February 9 – 15 has been designated as Child Passenger Safety Week for the year 2003. Buckle Up America and The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA), who help sponsor the event, are aiming to increase the public’s awareness of the need to restrain children in an appropriate safety seat.

Motor vehicle crashes are the leading cause of death for children ages four to 14. According to NHTSA, fewer children age 15 and younger were killed in motor vehicle crashes in 2001 than at any time since record keeping began in 1975. Vehicle fatalities dropped 8.6 percent from the previous year, and injuries fell by 7.3 percent for children age five to 15 and by 11 percent for children age four and under. Today, 95 percent of infants and 91 percent of toddlers, age one to age four, are restrained in safety seats. However, less than 10 percent of children who should be restrained in booster seats ride in one.

“We always place a high emphasis on the use and nonuse of child safety seats in vehicles that travel on the roads of West Virginia,” said Colonel Howard E. Hill, Jr., Superintendent of the West Virginia State Police. “This week, we will continue our efforts to make sure that children are as safe as possible by enforcing the law and teaching the importance of buckling up children.”

West Virginia law states that any child under the age of three must be placed, maintained and secured in a child passenger safety device system meeting applicable federal motor vehicle safety standards. The weight of the child is not a consideration in the law. Questions regarding weight should be addressed according to the manufacture’s recommendation for the seat. NHTSA recommends that children who have outgrown child safety seats be properly restrained in booster seats from about age four and 40 pounds to at least age eight, unless they are 4’9” tall. For more information, you can visit the NHTSA website at www.nhtsa.dot.gov or the Buckle Up America website at www.buckleupamerica.org.