Could Wearables Protect Youth and Children on Farms?

Details

• Personal Author:
  Hasan, Ragib ; Schwebel, David C. ; Weichelt, Bryan P.
• Description:
  The hazards for injury and death in agricultural settings are widely known, as are the risks that disproportionately affect children. Reputable data suggest one American child dies in an agriculture-related incident about every 3 days and another 50 suffer injuries serious enough to require an emergency room visit daily. Further, documented youth agricultural worker fatalities have exceeded those in all other industries combined for over a decade, with teenagers aged 15-17 making up 81% of all occupational fatalities. The most prominent traditional strategies to protect safety of children and young workers in agricultural settings are supervision (adults carefully watch children and young workers) and separation (children kept away from dangerous environments like animal pens, machinery, pools, and grain storage areas by physical fences/barriers; youth workers kept away from tasks they are not trained to engage in safely). Although effective when properly implemented, these strategies have had minimal impact on lowering injury risks or rates, largely due to challenges of consistently and reliably implementing and enforcing the strategies. We propose use of wearable technology as an alternative. Use of technology that automates separation of children and youth from dangerous agricultural risks may be more effective than reliance on human behavior. As a familiar example, suburban dogs are "fenced" with electronic systems that shock them if they try to escape the perimeter. We'd never dream of rigging such a system that shocked our children, but could wearable technology offer a comparable solution that reliably and consistently separates young children from risks in the agricultural environment? [Description provided by NIOSH]
• Subjects:
  Agriculture Occupational Health Protective Clothing Safety
• Keywords:
  Agricultural Safety Author Keywords: Bluetooth Beacons Child Farm Safety Children Emerging Technology Injury Prevention Wearables Wearable Technologies Youth Safety
• ISSN:
  1059-924X
• Document Type:
  Text
• Funding:
  Cooperative Agreement
• Genre:
  Journal Article
• Place as Subject:
  Alabama ; OSHA Region 4 ; OSHA Region 5 ; Wisconsin
• CIO:
  National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH)
• Topic:
  Workplace Safety & Health
• Location:
  North America
• Pages in Document:
  5 pdf pages
• Volume:
  28
• NIOSHTIC Number:
  nn:20067469
• Citation:
  J Agromedicine 2023 Jan; 28(1):77-80
• Contact Point Address:
  David C Schwebel, Department of Psychology, University of Alabama at Birmingham, Birmingham, AL, USA
• Email:
  schwebel@uab.edu
• Federal Fiscal Year:
  2023
• NORA Priority Area:
  Agriculture, Forestry and Fishing
• Performing Organization:
  Marshfield Clinic Research Foundation
• Peer Reviewed:
  True
• Start Date:
  20080930
• Source Full Name:
  Journal of Agromedicine
• End Date:
  20250929
• Collection(s):
  National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health
• Main Document Checksum:
  urn:sha-512:7b8828313fac599ff106cd398662893fc956d3eda39bcb325b674004ae489e51e3f1e65ceedd6a8d5cae81698d70174ea60992da9e926c9270f841767e58cba0
• Download URL:
  https://stacks.cdc.gov/view/cdc/230630/cdc_230630_DS1.pdf
• File Type:
  [PDF - 573.53 KB ]