Life-Jacket Laws Spur Use, Could Prevent Drownings

By Ronnie Cohen NEW YORK (Reuters Health) – Dr. Linda Quan lost count of the number of children she watched slowly die from drowning. That pain spurred the Seattle emergency room pediatrician to advocate for a Washington state law that now requires children 12 years and younger to wear life vests aboard small recreational boats. In a new study published in the journal Injury Prevention, Quan and her colleagues find that boaters mandated to wear life jackets were the most likely to wear them. More than 82 percent of them were not wearing life jackets.