According to Arrive Alive, car safety seats reduce the risk of death in passenger cars by 71% for infants and 54% for toddlers.
Since 2012, more than 11 500 children have been placed in car safety seats through the African Brain Child (ABC) Car Seats for Kids campaign.
The Be Quick to Click Car Seat Drive 2024, initiated by ABC in partnership with Supa Quick and Wheel Well, is a call to safeguard the lives of children against traumatic brain injuries (TBIs) – ‘the silent killer’ – by putting more children into secure car safety seats this October, Transport Month.
Anthony Figaji, Professor of Neurosurgery at the South African National Research Foundation, and director of ABC, sees road accidents as the single biggest killer of healthy children in South Africa:
“We have seen the human cost of motor vehicle accidents and TBIs in children we have not been able to save,” he says. “We have also seen those we have been able to save, but whose lives have been permanently impacted by injury that is readily preventable with the click of a seatbelt.
“There is an African saying that, ‘It takes a village to raise a child’. It also takes one to protect it. We need to rally personal responsibility around seatbelt usage – together as society.”
For children, surviving a TBI often isn’t the end of the story; emerging research shows that a single TBI may cause long-term inflammation that can damage neurons for years after the injury. This means a child suffering a TBI today may face further degeneration of their brain 20 or even 30 years from now.
From gathering dust to saving lives: an urgent call for car seats
Seatbelts are an essential safeguard against TBIs for older children, but toddlers and babies need the protection of a quality car safety seat. It is illegal in South Africa for an infant (a child under 3 years) to travel without being strapped into a suitable car seat – but they can be expensive and something that many families simply can’t afford. In South Africa, most children impacted by TBIs are from lower income households.
At the same time, many families have car seats, quickly outgrown and now unused, sitting in the garage – “we’ll get around to selling it online at some point” – that could be donated, refurbished and fitted to safeguard the life of a child.
How South Africans can support the Be Quick to Click campaign:
Car seat donations
Unused car seats can be dropped off at any Supa Quick branch nationwide and Be Quick to Click will donate it to a family that needs it, in October. The Be Quick to Click team will clean, inspect and ensure each seat meets the highest safety standards, before passing it on to a family in need.
Car seat sponsorships
By making a financial contribution, individuals or companies will directly support efforts to provide safe car seats for children across South Africa. Donations will help Be Quick to Click to cover the costs of cleaning, refurbishing and certifying used car seats, or purchasing new ones, for families who need them. Every donation counts toward making our roads safer for children.
Receive a car seat
To mark Transport Month, Be Quick to Click, Supa Quick and Wheel Well will hand over donated, checked and vetted car seats to families on 26 October 2024 at Supa Quick, cnr Main & Constantia Main Road, Plumstead, Cape Town. Any family wanting to receive a car seat can come down to Supa Quick between 9 a.m. and 12 p.m. to receive a car seat on that day.
Support Be Quick to Click
Be Quick to Click is a project of the African Brain Child initiative to drive public awareness, both in road users and authorities, of the importance of seatbelt usage and the ready prevention of TBIs. ABC is an internationally respected, leading research unit in traumatic brain injury in sub-Saharan Africa. Based in the Paediatric Neurosurgery Unit at Red Cross War Memorial Children’s Hospital, ABC is committed to providing advanced medical and surgical care, innovative research and promoting public awareness through social engagement.
For more information on the impact and prevention of TBIs in children, download the Be Quick to Click Research Report.
Join the drive to save lives!