Celebrating Children’s Day with Car Safety

Most parents will agree: there are few things more important than the protection of their children. And in celebrating children, it’s pivotal to discuss car safety. Parents play a pivotal role in ensuring their children are safe when travelling on the road. Ford Motor Company of sub-Sahara Africa is joining people across Nigeria in celebrating this year’s Children’s Day by sharing safety tips with parents.

According to a Nigeria Watch report on trends and patterns of fatal road accidents in Nigeria (2006-2014), “The incidence of fatal road accidents in Nigeria is phenomenal. Trend  analysis  of  fatal  road  accidents  between  June  2006  and  May  2014  using  Nigeria  Watch database  shows  that  15 090  lives  were  lost  to  fatal  road accidents in 3 075 events”.

Tips for parents:

1. Use car seats – It’s the law and car seats are there to ensure that your young children are protected from the devastating effects of a car crash.

2. Buckle up – It’s the law, and if children don’t wear their seat belts in a crash they are much more likely to be injured or killed than a child wearing a seat belt.

3. Never speed – Parents might be late for school, rushing to drop their children off at an afternoon activity or late for a birthday – but excessive speed continues to be a factor in road deaths globally.

4. Don’t drive distracted – We live in a busy world and we are always connected. Ensure you don’t get distracted and you don’t engage in activities such as texting whilst you drive or applying makeup when you’re stopped in early morning traffic on your way to the children’s school. Keep your hands on the steering wheel.

5. Don’t follow too closely – Cities such as Lagos are similar to other economic hubs and are notorious for traffic. Getting your children to and from school can be stressful but parents should keep the proper distance from the car in front of them. Rear end collisions are common and preventable.

6. Never drink and drive – Parents should remember that drinking and driving will result in deaths and cannot be tolerated.

Parents are becoming more safety conscious and it’s important to buy a car that ensures the utmost safety for your children. Ford has a longstanding commitment to developing and implementing innovations – such as the voice-activated SYNC with My Ford Touch and the SOS Post Crash Alert System – that make vehicles safer for Ford customers and their families.

There are a full range of family vehicles to choose from such as the Escape, Everest, Edge, Explorer, Expedition and Eco Sport among others.

Safety is inherent in the design, engineering and production of our vehicles. To this end, critical safety features such as airbags (up to nine in selected models), ABS anti-lock brake systems and ESC electronic stability control are standard across most of the Ford range available in Nigeria.