Maybe our parents weren't so wrong after all. At least that's what the authors of SuperFreakonomics would have us believe. Moms and pops take every precaution to protect their wee ones from harm, including installing top of the line car seats with the highest safety ratings. On Good Morning America, dads and writers Steven Levitt and Stephen Dubner told Robin Roberts that car seats may not be the key to keeping tots protected. Rather, the two men argue that harness restraints, like a regular old seat belt, will guard children against harm like a car seat or booster. While they don't promote ditching the seats all together, the below video does make one wonder about the modern day approach.
Check out the video and let me know if it sways your safety thinking at all.
Video courtesy of ABC
Dolce & Gabbana
I think it's ridiculous to say seatbelts are just as effective. If that were true, Nascar drivers could just have a shoulder harness and lapbelt and be done with it. Logic tells even the unresearched that having a 5 point restraint simply keeps a body in place and protected better than a shoulder harness that allows a body to slip out from under it.
There's a video showing a simulation of a 3-year-old in a 5 point restraint as opposed to a shoulder and lap belt, and the results are very plain. The crash test doll flew out from under the seat belt but stayed firmly in place in a carseat.
I also think it is incredibly irresponsible for these men to claim this. How many parents are now going to take children who are too young/small to be out of carseats and put them in regular belts, only to lose them in a crash? It already happens far too often, and claims like this will increase it.
1If you watch the whole video you will see these men tell you NOT to stop using your car seats, learn about the testing they have used and where their information comes from and how other results out there are biased because they simply rely on a parents word verses actual physical police evidence. They also tell you about how properly sized and used seatbelts can be just as effective as carseats.
2I did watch the video, I still think they're incredibly irresponsible.
3Simple fact my 4 year old can't get out of car seat....could get out of seat belt. That is why car seats are safer I know he is buckled in
4The guys who've done the studies DID NOT say that you should not put your kids in a car seat, they specifically say that you should, but they are bring to light the fact that proper seatbelts when used properly CAN BE as effective as a carseat and that's something we should all be more aware of and encouraging automakers to do something about! It's safer to have a proper seat and restraint system that's part of the vehicle than having a seperate piece attached to it. It's always been that way. What they're trying to highlight is that maybe it should be regulated in the auto industry so that vehicles are made to also fit children properly, not just some adults as many vehicle restraints don't fit many adults properly either. They have NEVER said you shouldn't use a carseat, but are trying to bring to light some of the issues out there, like they do with many other topics. If it weren't for people investigating things more than just taking someone else's word, we wouldn't have a lot of the positive change we have had in this world. We wouldn't have headlights, seatbelts, spedometers, and rules governing what can and can't be deemed roadworthy. If it weren't for people pushing for those positive changes we wouldn't have them. They're really bringing us all "food for thought"
5Simple fact: Many seatbelts in many vehicles dont even properly fit some adults. I am one of those adults. At 5'1", seat belts usually hit me across the neck. This poses a particularly dangerous threat in an accident. Forward momentum causing pressure on a child neck like that can cause Internal Decapitation, damage to the arteries in the neck, structural damage, nerve damage to one or both arms and death. Simple fact. The lap portion of seatbelts is meant to cross the tops of your legs and lower hip area, the bony structures, not your belly. Most adult seat belts do not fit children under a certain height where it should. Effect? Submarining- when a childs body slips down under the seatbelt and the lap belt can do catastrophic damage to internal abdominal organs, causing internal bleeding and death. Also known as "Seatbelt Syndrom". Thats just in school age kids. Testing has proven that rear facing children to age 4 is absolutely the safest for developing children due to growing bone structure and proportion. Please, PLEASE do your research. There are numerous crash test videos available on Youtube and many other places so you can see first hand the effects of an accident on a young child. Do not take these waffling yahoos at their word, they are deliberately trying to create controversy to sell their book. They could care less about the well being of your child.
6Now we will have more kids deaths because of people not using car seats, Thanks Good Morning America for doing this and killing kids.
7A couple things this piece didn't take into account:
81.A crash test dummy is not a child. A crash test dummy is placed in the correct position and won't wriggle, slouch or bend over, a young child will and does. If a child slouches in their seat belt then the lap belt will be across their stomach which in a crash will cause serious abdominal injuries. If a child is leaned over either to grab something or because they've fallen asleep they will not be well restrained by the belt. A 5 point harness holds a child in the correct position at all times, even when the child is asleep.
2. Freakonomics don't take injury statistics into account. Seat belt syndrome is a very serious and common injury in children in a seat belt.
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