Another fatal incident at nursery

[TJk86]

I really dislike nurseries for under 3s for many reasons but it seems that they are not even safe anymore these days. Every other week a story like this pops up on the news. To think a reform is needed to make nurseries safer (Better ratios for example)? In this instance, it’s also been decided that no one will bear the consequences of this accident which must be awful for the parents.

www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-15177433/Toddler-allergies-died-following-medical-episode-nursery-given-dairy-yogurt-mistake-parents-say.html

I don’t understand why nobody has been found to be at fault here. It is absolutely devastating that a family has lost a child, but even more so because it was entirely avoidable. This should never have happened.

This is what I don’t understand either. Blaming it on “busy lunchtime” shouldn’t be enough to avoid legal repercussions.

To say "every other week a story like this pops up on the news" would imply that 26 children a year die in nurseries due to incidents/accidents, which sounds like an exaggeration. Any preventable death of a child is too many but you don't want to scaremonger. Do you have any statistics?

It's been passed to the council Environmental Health department who can still bring criminal charges if they wish to.

It’s about one child a year, from either accident or intentional.

~55 a year die from accidents in/around the home (this is under 5 year olds), and about the same number of children (of any age) are murdered each year, with under 1s being the most likely to be killed, and parents and step parents being the most likely killers.

No one set out to hurt this child and it is right that no one should be prosecuted. It might make the parents feel better but it won’t achieve anything, and it will no nothing to prevent the same mistake happening elsewhere.

The child died because of their allergy, not because of a low paid nursery worker.

This incident is awful

However the amount of responsibility placed on often young, poorly paid early years workers is ridiculous - the sector is literally on its knees due to underfunding and the staffing crisis

Everyone wants the best care for their child yet early years staff are on the whole paid absolute peanuts

This is so tragic and absolutely awful for the poor parents but, realistically, the only way to guarantee this can't again happen is to either ban all allergens in nursery settings or to ban all children who have life threatening allergies from nurseries. Neither option is especially workable. A tragic accident that shouldn't have happened but then, aren't the majority of accidents entirely preventable?

Having an allergy isn’t fatal. He died because he was given an allergen that the nursery knew he was allergic too. It is at the very least negligence and so there should be consequences.

I agree. This is what I meant when I said there should be a reform. Government is giving away “free nursery places” but not actually funding to provide quality care.

OP, I'm not sure what you are trying to achieve here? Claiming children die every week in nurseries is pure scaremongering. There will be many, many parents on a parenting website reading this. They don't need you filling their heads with fear.

There isn't enough money to fund nursery places now. We can't afford a state funded nanny for every child.

No-one will care as well for your child as you will yourself- sounds harsh, but it's true. Accidents happen, but I doubt there's a death in a nursery every other week OP.

You dislike nurseries for under 3s, fine.

So what's your affordable alternative care plan?

Horrendous incident but its pretty tactless of you to act like we all have a choice to do anything other than our absolute best as parentd to find reliable, safe childcare.

Statements like "I dislike them" implies you persnolly have had the privilege to decide to opt out of using one. Which is great for you but not so much for those of us getting up tomorrow and entrusting our kids to others because we have to.

So thanks for that.

What other reasons are there to dislike nurseries?

They enable women too much?

No. I'm sorry but I am a low paid nursery worker and I do think that someone should be prosecuted. Allergy deaths are preventable. Someone is responsible for this.

I’m always curious as to why more people don’t use childminders- they are usually cheaper than nurseries and offer a ‘home from home’ environment. I was lucky enough to find really good ones for my DCs. But perhaps incidents like this are just as likely with a childminder as they are at a nursery- I don’t know any statistics on that.

But either way, no parents should be made to feel guilty for choosing nurseries or childminders or nannies or whatever they need to use to enable them to go to work, since most families cannot be financially supported on only one wage.

They need to pay creche workers more and have more staff members.

I worked in a creche once. I left as i was so terrified that i might harm a child or cause harm. I was left alone in a room with a load of toddlers once. I had to bring toddlers to the bathroom over and over while standing at the door and trying to watch the rest. There is not enough staff

The new "free nursery places" have nothing to do with this tragic incident which happened before the scheme was introduced.

It would be far more useful to consider implementing simple additional measures for safety, such as a second pair of eyes check on allergy meals which could be more broadly applied than just in nurseries, restaurants. That could easily be implemented into Ofsted inspection requirements and the like.

I'd be willing to bet that children are statistically safer at nursey than at home sadly.

I don't agree it's every other week but I was also personally not keen on nurseries for under threes and had a wonderful childminder.

Hmm, so the previous government changing the staff to child ratio for two year olds from 1:4 to 1:5 is having serious implications on quality of care? Who'd have thought it!

If you bring in changes that sound great because...you know 'free' childcare , but they lead to dangerous incidents because staff can't manage on those ratios, then they weren't a good idea.

I worked in a nursery where children were given the wrong food quite frequently, almost always by one particular elderly colleague who couldn’t be bothered to read labels.
So yes, this terribly sad situation does not surprise me.

The death of a child in this context can never be considered an “honest mistake” absolutely appalling use of words.

This, it's pure privilege to declare that you dislike nursery's for under 3's both from the point that you clearly don't have the necessity to use them and also to not understand that for many children the nursery is the safe haven from a very chaotic/dangerous home life.

Don’t be ridiculous. I hardly ever hear of fatal accidents at nursery. 🙄 And I’ve had 2 kids in nursery from 9 months and most of my friends are working parents who have had the same. Literally don’t know anyone who has had a child die in nursery. The most traumatic thing that happened to one of mine is that she tripped and fell into a patch of stinging nettles during forest school. 🤷🏻‍♀️

Do you know where children mostly die? At home. In accidents. In their sleep. And due to abuse and neglect. I don’t hear anyone advocating that all children be institutionalised to keep them safe just because the Daily Fail reported that an abusive dad killed his 2 year old.