By Australian Hot Water
M
ost people, when they think about severe burns, automatically imagine fire as the main cause of these devastating, lifechanging and sometimes fatal injuries.
Fire is more dangerous that hot water in many ways – hot water doesn’t stay hot, it doesn’t spread to clothes and other fabrics and materials in the same way as fire does. Once hot water has made contact with skin, it starts to cool almost immediately. However, hot water and liquid vapours can still be very dangerous and they present a particular danger to babies and young children in and around the home. What is a scald? Burns from hot liquids or vapours are known as scalds and, in the home, they can happen in a matter of seconds but have lifelong implications. This is why you need to know about preventing them and, if an accident does happen, what to do to treat them rapidly and to lessen the severity. Scalds in the home and why they’re serious The main cause of scald injuries in the home are hot drinks, particularly tea and coffee. If you tend to drink black coffee or herbal teas, then you don’t add cold milk to bring the temperature down a few degrees, 44
Peninsula Kids – Summer 2018/19
so these are especially risky to have around small children. A scalding injury is often more dangerous to a baby or a child than an adult simply because if, for example, 200ml of boiling water falls onto your leg, it’ll scald only a relatively small area of your skin. If the same amount falls onto a baby’s leg, not only will it cover a larger proportion of the baby’s skin area, but a baby’s skin is also thinner than an adult’s. This means that damage to the lower layers of skin happens much faster and is more devastating. How most scalding accidents happen As you can imagine, children are most likely to be scalded at home, particularly in the kitchen, although accidents with hot water also happen in bathrooms, especially if there’s no mixer tap or tempering valve. Tempering valves use a sensor to monitor the temperature of the hot water being drawn and automatically add enough cold water to reach a maximum of 50C for domestic hygiene outlets. If you’re having a tempering valve or another water safety device fitted then you should always use a licensed plumber. You can also install childresistant taps so that your children can’t operate the taps themselves, but these don’t control or reduce the temperature of the water. Hot drinks Hot drinks are the most common cause of scalding injuries to children