Taranga Zoo in Sydney participated in a major city festival celebrating light, music, and ideas recently. It handed out illuminated wristbands to kids as part of this. It encouraged them to recycle the bracelets at the end of the evening. But, it omitted to mention the potentially deadly danger of the five button batteries they contained.
More Than Just a Cute Button Battery
Earlier this month, leading consumer advocacy group Choice cautioned parents that two kids previously died from ingesting button batteries due to severe internal burning.
Furthermore, a national safety adviser informs that 20 Australian kids receive emergency treatment for this every week which is equally alarming.
We don’t know whether there is a correlation with the Taranga Zoo promotion. What we do know is this potentially deadly danger must be present in just about every American home.
Why Button Batteries are Particularly Dangerous
Button batteries are a perfect size for clogging children’s’ throats. If they were larger, they might not go down at all because of coughing and choking. If they were smaller, they should pass fairly harmlessly through the body. Their terminals are near each other allowing a rapid, high discharge through salty body tissue.
Kids unfortunately don’t understand the risks attached to putting the smooth shiny objects in their mouths. They soon forget they swallowed one, because soft oesophagus tissue has a relatively high pain threshold. Moreover, older children may be reluctant to report incidents for fear of getting into trouble.
Common Household Devices with Button Batteries
Tomorrow, we’ll report on ways to help avoid this happening. For now, you need to know button batteries are common in bathroom scales, hearing aids, and reading lights. Alarmingly, the potentially deadly danger is also present in talking greetings cards, games and toys.
You’ll also find button batteries in watches, thermometers, and remote controls for cars and security systems. We are at a loss to understand why there are no prominent safety warnings, or more child proof battery research.
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Preview Image: Button Battery Dangers
