More kids are riding in car safety seats these days, but child traffic fatalities have not fallen because kids are spending more time in cars, according to federal health researchers.
Each year since 1983 in the United States, from 500 to 700 children under 5 have died in traffic accidents.Over the same period, as mandatory safety-seat laws spread to all states, use of those seats rose from 38 percent to 84 percent for children ages 1 to 4 and from 60 percent to 83 percent for infants under 1, the Centers for Disease Control reported Thursday.
"It's our suspicion that children are spending more and more time in cars, so more kids are exposed to risk for longer periods of time," said Dr. Julie Russell, an epidemiologist with the CDC's Division of Injury Control. "The restraints are very effective, but you have more kids in cars more often."
Russell cited a National Highway Traffic Safety Administration study that found, over a four-year period, a 10 percent annual increase in child fatalities at peak commuting times.
"That's generally a pretty safe time to drive, so that leads you to believe more kids are on the road," she said.
Another study has found that total miles driven in the United States are up nearly 20 percent in four years, "and you'd expect they'd take their kids along," Russell said.
Last year, 624 children under 5 were killed in motor vehicle accidents, a 14 percent drop from 712 in 1989.
"Nobody's willing to say that's the beginning of a trend," Russell said. "Statistically, you see numbers bounce around some, so we're reluctant to say one way or the other that it's going to change very much."
In 1983, 602 children under 5 died in traffic accidents; the number has hovered in the 500-to-700 range since.
Since 1985, all 50 states and the District of Columbia have required car restraints for young children. But penalties vary, and some states require restraints only up to age 1, the CDC said.