Drowning In Minnesota: It Doesn’t Look Like You Think It Does

Summer is an invitation to take a splash in the ocean, a lake or swimming pool — something millions of Americans will do this Fourth of July weekend — and tragedy often ruins the fun. More than 3,700 Americans drowned in 2017, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention statistics, more than 700 of them under the age of 14. In Minnesota, the drowning death rate per 100,000 residents was 0.6.

About 10 people drown every day in the United States, where drowning is the fifth-leading cause of unintentional injury death, according to the CDC. About one in five people who die from drowning are children 14 and younger, and for every child who dies from drowning, another five are rescued, the agency said.

The CDC said the annual death toll doesn’t include an additional 332 people who drown every year in boating-related incidents.

The five states with the highest downing death rates in 2017, the latest year for which statistics are available, are:

1. Hawaii, 3.2 drowning deaths per 100,000 population
2. Louisiana, 2.1 drowning deaths per 100,000 population
3. Florida, 1.9 drowning deaths per 100,000 population
4. Arkansas, 1.8 drowning deaths per 100,000 population
5. Idaho, 1.7 drowning deaths per 100,000 population

One of the problems with drowning is it doesn’t look at all like the dramatic scenarios depicted on television and in the movies. Real-life drowning happens quietly, and there are no flailing arms and frantic calls for help. People can’t simply stop drowning long enough to take in a breath of air and call for help. The human body isn’t built that way.

Children can drown right in front of parents, as little as 10 feet away. That happened in New York a few years back, when a boat captain and former lifeguard trained to recognize what’s called Instinctive Drowning Response saw what the parents of a 10-year-old girl couldn’t see from a few feet: Their daughter was drowning. He was able to save the girl because he knows what drowning looks like.

Drowning is the second-most common cause of accidental death among children 14 and younger, according to the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. About 750 children drown each year, 375 of whom do so within 25 yards of a parent or adult. More startling, the CDC said 10 percent of parents watch their children drown because they don’t know it’s happening.

Before people drown, they may thrash around in the water — a sign they’re in “aquatic distress,” which may or may not happen before a drowning. They’re normally able to assist in their own rescue by grabbing lifelines, throw rings and other devices.

A true drowning victim, like the little girl saved by the boat captain, is most often helpless. That’s because the body instinctively responds to drowning, according to lifeguard Francesco Pia, who came up with the name, Instinctive Drowning Response, to describe the process.

Rescuers have as few as 20 seconds and up to a minute to save a person from drowning.

Here are five tips for recognizing drowning, as originally published in the Coast Guard’s On Scene magazine and shared by Slate.com:

1. In all but rare circumstances, people are physiologically unable to call for help. The respiratory system is designed for breathing, and speech is a secondary function. “Breathing must be fulfilled before speech occurs,” the article said.

2. A drowning person’s mouth alternately sinks below the surface of the water and then reappears, but the mouth is never above the surface long enough to exhale, inhale and cry for help. A drowning person will exhale and inhale quickly before their mouths start to sink below the surface of the water again.

3. Drowning people can’t flag down help. “Nature instinctively forces them to extend their arms laterally and press down on the water’s surface,” the article said. “Pressing down on the surface of the water permits drowning people to leverage their bodies so they can lift their mouths out of the water to breathe.”