General Chat

Sometimes I do wonder whether a common sense exam wouldn't be a bad idea during ante natal classes when you come across incidences like this.

Article I read said that she was drinking beer and had a poor grasp of English when confronted with the damage being done to her baby...not sure how true this is..but there you go.

Some reports say that his legs were blistering...but we are talking newspapers here soooo...I'll keep an open mind for now.

I am overly paranoid where sun is concerned as my youngest has areas of her skin that contain no pigment so is SO at risk I fear my judgement is clouded for other cases. xxx

Be interesting to hear what advice doctors are giving the parents of young children.

Every time I visit mine she tells me to keep the children out of the sun. The best sunscreen is a hat and a shirt.

She told me children under 6 months are too young to be using sunscreen. After that, a "mineral" sunscreen with zinc or titanium should be used.

Rose

Not sure if thay are available in the UK (not having very young children anymore) the best solution I've seen for supervised roaming youngesters at the seaside is a fabric like all in one with a hood, similar in style to a wet suit. But how many parents would think of buying them if they are only in the sun in the UK?

Lynda - Nope, nothing useful on the bottom of the bottles, even the newest ones from a major high st chemist......but they can be recycled when empty!

you can buy a very decent sunlotion for £10 int he avon, lasts me all summer for littleman, and his friends when there here, £10 a year is a small price to pay to make sure my son doesnt burn,

Brought up by the sea, spent days in the water and on the sands, have never used sunscreen and am lucky enough never to change colour, quite pale at the end of summer, but I stay out of very hot sun and kept my son out of it too. The sun was not so fierce when I was young, the situation is fairly new in this country.

I had my first son in Cyprus, and was very proud of the fact that he never got sunburnt... and at 37 is still careful about the sun, covering up etc.

It takes just half an hour for a baby's delicate skin to be burnt badly. So this mum might not have realised that there was a problem.... also, when the sun is at it's height, a parasol is absolutely no protection... it needs to be double or triple layered at least to filter the sun.

When I was a manager, I made sure even our darker skinned clients had suntan lotion, and were kept out of the strong sun... because contrary to popular belief, black skin does actually burn quite nastily too.

This mum may not have been negligent in the slightest, as far as she was aware... but didn't know all the facts... so many of us in the UK don't, which is very sad and very dangerous.

Love

Daff xxxx

No sun protection is too expensive where protection is called for especially in children of all ages,,,they have a shelf life date for safety reasons, a 2 year old lotion will have lost its protection and you'd might aswell use cooking oil.
young skin burns even in the shade of trees.

In front of me are 5 'old' bottles - none have a date on them. Purchased very recently are 2 new ones, again no date. Obviously, not the brands which do bother to date stamp them!

As a mother who's 16 year old child (at the time) ended up in hospital with severe sun burn, the threat of melanoma is always present. Despite her experiences and caution now, she still manages to get burnt. As adults we can only do our best and be aware that young and old skin is more susceptible to burning.

edit - took me too long to go hunting, lol. Thank you for the advice. :)

Here you go DET...most its 2-3 yrs.

http://www.sunsmart.org.uk/advice-and-prevention/sunscreens/sunscreens

DET they lose protection the older they are.ie F12 would be 10/11 next year.

DET, I have them all over, old bottles, some bought for my dad when he visited. He was a lifelong sun hog. He wouldn't use cream or cover up. He died of melanoma.

Poor little lad.
We had my 9wk old granddaughter here at weekend. we had the parasol over her at all times....and her mum put cream on her.
It made me think of the babies/kids who had no protection,and I bet there were a few :((

Sea breeze does make it feel cooler and it wouldnt take much for a little one to burn.

Marion

On the subject of sun screen /lotions - does anyone know if they have a best before guidance date? As has been pointed out, they are quite expensive. No doubt many of us have numerous half battles lurking in the cupboard, which don't appear to have anything resembling a date of any sort on them.

These days, cream is just not enough. Covering up, hats and shade -- or just plain staying indoors when the sun is high -- is the only sure thing. (Especially when you consider the cost of good sunscreen, and how quickly it gets used, and how many people really can't afford to go through it like that.)

There needs to be more public education and more public education. Doctors and other health providers need to hammer this idea home from day one -- like infant car seats, something never heard of when my parents had kids. It's really something fairly new in human history, and this generation of parents is dealing with new circumstances.

I got terrible sunburn one year in Cuba -- was staying with a friend, got to the beach resort we went to for a weekend and she conked out, I spent the afternoon in the water with her (dark-skinned) children (and this was 30 years ago, not to portray her as a bad mother). It was the first week in May. To a Canadian, that's late winter. I had no idea of the strength of the sun I was exposing myself to. I had a blister that covered my entire upper back.

And I have a family full of skin cancer. I wasn't uninformed. Just not sufficiently informed.

The article says He was visiting the south coast resort from London with his 29year old mother. Although it is possible she left him with another family member while she went into the water or went to get lunch.

It can be very deceptive at the coast however hot the day.
I have always lived within an hours drive from the beach and been caught out on the odd occassion when it doesnt appear as hot as it is inland

My children were always covered in loose clothing hat with a neck flap and sunscreen.
I had them in the shade as much as possible, and kept them away from the beach when very young.
The youngest who is at comprehensive still keeps covered as fair skinned and my older daughter who is darker, still covers with sunscreen.

I feel very sorry for the baby, the mother must feel very distressed by it.

People should take care with children and pets.

My cousin lives in australia and the family always cover up which is the norm over there.

We have so little good weather here that people tend to rush out and not always think of the damage the sun can do

Teresa

No arrests so far although I wish they would at least convict the mother of neglect.

Tawny

i couldnt add wt i feel without being suspended, some people dont have the brains they were born with,

to not cream a child in the heat we had is abuse, xxx

I'm not surprised Tawny, when I lived in a seaside resort it was just appalling how many parents had very young children in full sun for hours at a time , whose fair skin was burning red.

Hope the little boy will be ok,

Rose xx

I have just read that a 5 month old baby boy has suffered 20% burns after his mother took him to the beach on Sunday. The temperature that day reached 25 degrees and yet it took a police community support officer (PCSO) to realise anything was wrong. An ambulance was called and he was taken to hospital for treatment. Surely the baby would have been out of sorts long before the PCSO spotted him