SHARM EL-SHEIKH - Karim, an adventurous two-yearoldr, was playing ball near his family's swimming pool in the resort town of Sharm el-Sheikh. His seven- and 10-year-old sisters were playing tag close by. The phone rang and their mother went inside to take the call. Two minutes later, she heard the girls scream. She rushed back into the yard; saw the girls by the edge of the pool and Karim underwater. It was too late. The little fellow had drowned, leaving his family devastated. Just last month, another family also experienced tragedy while vacationing in Sharm, when a dip at a hotel swimming pool took a turn for the worst. Their little daughter suffered brain damage due to prolonged submersion underwater, while her brother drowned. At yet another Sharm hotel swimming pool, an Italian tourist fell into the pool and drowned. His body was flown to Italy for burial. Vacations should not be marred with tragedy. Children and adults alike should not lose their lives because of preventable accidents. But, as new private swimming pools, both residential and commercial, continue to spring up throughout Sharm and the rest of Egypt, residents and guests have reason for concern. In July and August of this year, Sharm's central police station recorded 14 deaths by drowning, 12 of them foreigners. Since the beginning of this year, Sharm International Hospital has received the bodies of 15 people, who died by drowning, while South Sinai Hospital has received 12. Some were adults, who were drunk when they drowned. These are only the statistics for Sharm el- Sheikh. What about the rest of Egypt? What about those cases that went unreported? This dilemma is - at least in part - the result of negligence. Safety notices are of little effect when met with a nonchalant attitude. Most people don't care to read them; they only want to have fun. Parents, the first to blame when such accidents occur, suffer the most. How long did it take to answer a phone call or a doorbell, to grab a couple of drinks, or to engage in deep conversation before their attention was diverted from their child? It takes less than a couple of minutes and a few inches of water for a child to drown in a perilous swimming environment. But parents are not the only ones to blame. In the case of hotel pools, the hotel management also bear some of the responsibility. There are pool safety standards to be met and, if the hotel is negligent in meeting those standards, the victim's family has every right to take legal action. But sometimes the blame falls solely on the victim. Recently, web pages of certain British law firms have been soliciting clients whose family members have died or been injured in Egypt -and only Egypt. Just last week, three lawsuits were filed by foreigners against hotels in Sharm, where their loved ones died in swimming pool accidents. They may or may not have strong cases. But what is one to make of the many drownings involving inebriated adults, often hotel guests who drink themselves silly as part of some 'all-inclusive' packages? “Hotels that offer the all-inclusive packages are also to blame for such accidents,” says a local lawyer, on condition of anonymity. “They should remove alcohol from their packages.” “A drunken person becomes disoriented when he falls into water,” explains Dr Sameh Soliman, the General Manager and a co-founder of South Sinai Hospital in Sharm el-Sheikh. “Muscles relax completely, causing knees to bend; the person reaches the bottom of the pool fast. He can't push himself up. His neck muscles give way causing the head to fall back, allowing water into the airway,'' he told The Egyptian Gazette. “The person becomes asphyxiated and unable to scream. In a matter of seconds, the drunken person is in deep trouble. It could take a few minutes for the lifeguard to realise that this person is drowning. “In South Sinai Hospital,” Dr Soliman adds, “we treat intoxication in conjunction with drowning. You cannot ignore the main reason for the submersion, 'muscular skeletal dysfunction', due to the combination of intoxication and falling in water.” Further complicating matters is the fact that hotels may hire untrained lifeguards. “On many occasions, lifeguards are not present, or, if they are present, they are preoccupied with other responsibilities around the hotel; their attention is on the water polo match, flirting with female guests, lying down, reading, their eyes are closed, or they are self-conscious about their Ray-Ban sunglasses and their cool muscular six packs,” Mohamed, a diving instructor at a major hotel dive centre, told this newspaper. Where can we go from here? Needless to say, hotels in Sharm and throughout Egypt should give priority to safety, properly maintaining their pools, hiring qualified and vigilant lifeguards, avoiding situations that would encourage drunkenness near pools and providing parents of young children with a welcome kit upon checkin with individual instructions for pool safety. Otherwise, to protect children, the US Consumer Product Safety Commission offers the following helpful tips for pool owners: • Never leave a child unsupervised near a pool. • Completely fence the pool. Effective barriers and locks are necessary preventive measures, but there is no substitute for supervision. • Do not consider young children 'drown proof' because they have had swimming lessons; young children should always be watched carefully while swimming. • Do not use flotation devices as a substitute for supervision. • Never use a partially covered pool, since children may become trapped under the cover. Remove it completely. • Place tables and chairs well away from the pool fence to prevent children from climbing into the pool area. • Keep toys away from the pool area because a young child playing with the toys could accidentally fall in the water. • Remove steps to above ground pools when not in use. • Have a telephone at poolside to avoid having to leave children unattended in or near the pool to answer a telephone elsewhere. Keep emergency numbers in the poolside telephone. • Learn how to perform CPR (cardiopulmonary resuscitation). • Keep rescue equipment by the pool. Pools are supposed to be sites for enjoyment and relaxation. But there is a world of difference between safe and unsafe swimming. Taking swimming pool safety measures into your hands, whether you are a parent or a hotel manager concerned about his guests' safe vacations, will give you pleasant, unforgettable memories for a lifetime.
