Headline in the LAT: “Bounce house injuries rocket; child hurt every 46 minutes“.
Thought: maybe that child needs to be more careful.
Buried in the article:
- “Overall, an estimated 64,657 were treated 1990 to 2010, the researchers found. The numbers suggest 31 children a day in 2010 were treated in emergency rooms for broken bones, sprains and cuts from injuries in bounce-house accidents. That is the equivalent of one injured child every 46 minutes, they said.” Broken bones, sprains, and cuts? So, basically, the same injuries kids have been getting for hundreds of years, with or without bounce-houses?
- “From 1995 to 2010, there was a statistically significant 15-fold increase in the number and rate of these injuries, with an average annual rate of 5.28 injuries per 100,000 U.S. children,” the authors said in the abstract of their findings. “The increase was more rapid during recent years, with the annual injury number and rate more than doubling between 2008 and 2010.” But earlier in the article, they admit that bounce-houses have also become much, much more popular in recent years. Are these increases meaningful without knowing how many bounce-house-hours (if you’ll pardon the coinage) kids are getting on average? I mean, sure, the number of injuries might be going up, but does that mean that bounce-houses are becoming more dangerous? Or just that kids are getting more time in them, and thus the odds of them getting injured increase?
Transparent excuse to link something that’s technically not a bounce-house, but probably as dangerous:
