Joint Efforts Reinforced to Advocate Children Drowning Prevention for Long-term Safety

China Diving and Salvage Association (CDSA) and Royal National Lifeboat Institution (RNLI) has teamed up again to release a video on drowning prevention safety skills for young people on the fourth UN World Drowning Prevention Day that falls on July 25 every year, calling the society to continue pay attention to the safety risks faced by young people and promote their awareness and skills in drowning prevention.

Produced by CDSA’s Sub-committee for Public Safety and Emergency Rescue, the video features four aspects of water environment, self rescue, drowning rescue and first aid technique which are important to ensure children’s safety in water-related activities in summer. With primary school students filmed to talk and demonstrate the drowning prevention knowledge and skills, the video is expected to effectively reach the young generation who are more savvy about digital information.

“As a AAAA-rated national association specialized in professional diving and salvage, CDSA has regarded the promotion of public awareness and skills on drowning prevention as one of our major social responsibilities and work directions,” said Song Jiahui, president of CDSA. “It also manifests our effort and action to implement the idea to put life and safety first as instructed by president Xi Jinping.”

The cooperation between CDSA and RNLI began in June 2023, when both sides signed a framework agreement to jointly promote the UN World Drowning Prevention Day that falls on July 25 annually. It has been decided that both will work together to promote the awareness and capacity on drowning prevention in China through series of publicity campaign.

Drowning is the third leading cause of unintentional jury death. The global report on drowning by WHO shows that at least 240,000 people die from drowning each year. According to the “2022 China Youth Drowning Prevention Big Data Report” released by the People's Daily Online Public Opinion Data Center, about 59,000 people die from drowning in China every year, of which minors account for more than 95%.

According to Liu Hongbing, Vice President of CDSA’s Sub-committee for Public Safety and Emergency Rescue, the sub-committee has targeted at promoting the capacity building for public safety and rescue to serve and adapt to national emergency management since its establishment on December 30, 2022, striving to promote the positive transformation of emergency response towards proactive prevention. “Promoting drowning prevention by firstly educating children is not only effective to prevent potential risks that might happen to individuals, but also a useful approach to set up a long-term mechanism for safety prevention,” he added.