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CNN Live At Daybreak

Keeping Kids Safe in Cars

Aired August 30, 2001 - 08:21   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
VINCE CELLINI, CNN ANCHOR: Now the safety of your children, a much more serious subject. The government reporting a sharp drop in the number of kids killed by vehicle air bags, and several factors are credited for the decline.

And we'll hear about them now from Chuck Hurley. He is the executive director of the National Air Bag and Seat Belt Safety Campaign.

Good morning, Chuck.

CHUCK HURLEY, AIR BAG SAFETY CAMPAIGN: Good morning.

CELLINI: So tell us about some of these factors. People must be getting the message.

HURLEY: Well, there is some remarkable news. The report of the National Safety Council's Air Bag and Seat Belt Safety Campaign today finds a 90.3 percent reduction in the rate of child fatalities from air bags. This is truly remarkable progress, but still nine kids were killed last year by air bags, and that's exactly nine too many.

CELLINI: Well, it seems really pretty simple: kids 12 and under sit in the back seat, but that doesn't always happen. What are some of the other things that maybe parents or other people are violating once they put kids into a car or people into a car?

HURLEY: Well, the three basic rules, the ABCs if you will, of air bag safety are always have the seat back and sit back, B is buckle everyone, and C, as you mentioned, is children 12 and under always properly restrained in the rear seat. If these rules are followed, we can bring that number to zero. These are entirely preventable tragedies.

CELLINI: How tough or lax are seat belt laws from state to state? And, Chuck, do you believe we should have some sort of a universal seat belt law?

HURLEY: Well, you make a very good point. Seat belt use is really the key indicator of safety for our kids. In fact, fully 60 percent of fatally injured kids in car crashes are completely unbuckled. That's just not acceptable. Kids don't set the level of risk they face, adults do that for them. California, for example, has gotten to 90 percent belt use, when we as a country are really in the low 70s. If we could get the country to where California has proven we can go, we can save about 4,000 lives a year. The National Safety Council doesn't know many ways to save 4,000 lives a year, so that is really the key objective.

CELLINI: And a recent survey said that nearly a third of people still don't buckle up when they get in the car -- about 29 percent, and that's amazing when you hear about all of this seat belt safety.

But I also want to move on to now the holiday weekend coming up and perhaps some tips or some reminders for folks, who are going to be hitting the road for vacations.

HURLEY: Well, this is a very heavily-traveled weekend. And it is important -- the single most important thing that people can do to protect their families is to make sure that everyone is buckled up every single time -- kids 12 and under properly restrained in the rear seat.

The full report of the Air Bag and Seat Belt Safety Campaign is available at the National Safety Council's Web site, www.nsc.org.

CELLINI: All right. Thank you very much, Chuck Hurley, the executive director of National Air Bag and Seat Belt Safety -- we appreciate you joining us and talking about this subject -- and some bright news in this area. Thank you very much.

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