InnisfilToday welcomes letters to the editor ([email protected]). Please include your full name, daytime phone number and address (for verification of authorship, not publication). The following letter from Mark Elgar is in response to LETTER: Ex-lifeguard tired of 'cavalier attitude' on the water published on Sept. 11.
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I am writing in response to (letter writer) Robert Barratt’s call for mandatory personal flotation device (PFD) wearing on boats.
The cavalier attitudes toward water safety and ignorance about the dangers is intractable problem. Over the years, attempts have been made to address it: the Pleasure Craft Operators Card is one example. But because its requirements are so loose and lenient, it has been fairly ineffective, and our waterways are a largely unregulated wild west of incompetence, stupidity, and recklessness. Did I mention drug and alcohol impairment?
But would mandatory PFD use in boats solve these problems? Reduce deaths on the water?
According to the Life Saving Society Canada report entitled Canadian Drowning Report 2017, boating of all kinds accounts for about 29 per cent of drownings. And most of those who drowned were not wearing PFDs. But the majority of drownings in Canada do not involve boating in any way. Swimming is the single largest category at 28 per cent. Another 15 per cent of drowning victims are walking, running or playing near the water. And 9 per cent of drownings occur during bathing.
So, would compulsory PFD use in boats reduce drownings? Of course, the answer is yes, somewhat. But if you’re going to do that, what about the swimmers and the others? Should everyone entering the water to swim be forced to wear a PFD? Everyone sitting on the beach? Everyone walking along Orillia’s boardwalk? Everyone getting into a shower or a bathtub?
Compulsory PFD use for non-boaters would be seen as massive government intrusion and overreach. In my opinion, making PFD use compulsory in boats would be equally ineffective, unnecessary and unacceptable.
Mark Elgar
Orillia
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