28 October 2007

This is a gimmee

We all know the Official Bad Dog Position on Children - they're necessary, but not particularly enjoyable. However, we have also recognized that if one happens to have children, one must make a good, honest effort to ensure nothing godawful happens to them.

Which brings us to this new story - Baby Drowns In Bucket Of Bleach

A 9-month-old Quincy girl drowned Saturday morning after she climbed into a bucket filled with bleach, the Norfolk County District Attorney’s office said.

The Boston Herald reported that the baby’s mother Lee Ann Auperlee, 20, was watching three children inside her Sumner Street apartment when her daughter Mya crawled out of her sight and into a bucket on the kitchen floor.

Now, again, I don't have any children of my own, and the stepweasels were past bucket-drowning age by the time they started hanging around with me. Nonetheless, I am aware that babies are somewhat prone to die, and thus one has to take certain precautions if babies are in the area.

Theses precautions, as I understand it, include (but are not limited to):
no loaded firearms on the floor,
no knives on the floor,
no razor blades on the floor,
not leaving them alone in a bath,
not leaving them in a car with the windows up on a hot day,
not leaving them in a car with the windows down in the winter,
no leaving them unsupervised with packs of strange dogs,
no rat poison on the floor,
no gin in their bottles,
no access to hazardous substances,
no unsupervised time with liquids deeper than .5 inches,
no unsupervised time with buckets of hazardhouse liquids.

Good lord, people. Do not leave your crawling baby with access to a big old bucket of bleach. That doesn't take a rocket scientist.

Curran said Auperlee told her the baby was in the living room just before the drowning.

“She said Mya was tapping at the TV then she just crawled away toward the kitchen,” Curran said.

[...]

No charges have been filed by police. Toxicology and other tests are still pending.

Poor child. We disapprove.