I'm Beck, an Aussie living in Canada for the past 4 years. I recently had my first (and last!) baby. He is 1 year old now and adorable. I love online baby and mum forums. And I learned a lot of important things from those forums. Especially my group of Feb '11 ladies.
I want to stress to you guys the importance of rear facing baby in the car seat. While I was researching Australian rear facing laws, I was shocked to find out it is law only up until 6 months!
The American Academy of Pediatrics now advises parents to keep toddlers in rear-facing car seats until age 2.
A 2007 study in the journal Injury Prevention found that children under age 2 are 75 percent less likely to die or to be severely injured in a crash if they are rear-facing. Another study found riding rear-facing to be five times safer than forward-facing."A rear-facing child safety seat does a better job of supporting the head, neck and spine of infants and toddlers in a crash, because it distributes the force of the collision over the entire body," AAP: Toddlers in rear-facing seat until 2 - CNN.com
Basically babies spines and necks are still developing at the age of one and two. The vertebrae do not begin to fuse until age 3-6 years old. This is why rear-facing is the safest as it gives more support and protection to the incomplete vertebrae and therefore the spinal cord. With vertebrae in pieces, a forward facing child has a greater chance of damage to the spinal cord when their head and neck whip forward and back in a crash. Rear Facing Seat - Proper Safety Seat Directions
When a child is forward facing and a frontal collision occurs the child is flung forward in the seat, being caught by the harness. This puts stress on the neck, the spine, and the internal organs. The neck is completely unprotected when the head is catapulted forward. Whether the child can withstand the force of impact has nothing to do with muscle power. It is the spine that has to keep the head in place. A child's spine and skeleton is still growing. It has not solidified into bone yet, but is still very soft with lots of cartilage. This means that the neck is vulnerable to the great force it's being subjected to in a car crash and in a worst case scenario the neck will stretch so much that the spine snaps. This is called internal decapitation and basically means that the child has been internally beheaded. In tests, the dummy's neck has been stretched as much as 2 inches, but the spine can not be stretch more than a quarter of an inch before snapping.
In a rear facing car seat, the child is flung into the back of the seat and the force of impact is distributed along the whole back of the seat. The neck, spine and internal organs are not subjected to the stress of the force and are therefore protected.
In a forward facing seat the neck is subjected to a force equivalent to 300-320kg, while in a rear facing seat, the force on the neck is equivalent to 50kg. Rear Facing - the way forward
In Sweden, it is standard practice to keep their children rear-facing up to the age of 5, or as much as 55 lbs. From 1992 through June 1997, only 9 children properly restrained rear-facing died in motor vehicle crashes in Sweden, and all of these involved catastrophic crashes with severe intrusion and few other survivors. Larger Swedish child restraints are designed to accommodate these larger children. US-certified restraints can be used rear-facing until the maximum weight limit is reached or until the top of the child's head is within one inch of the top of the seat, whichever comes first.
In the US, motor vehicle crashes are the number one cause of death for children. The extra protection offered by rear-facing seats is something that parents should take advantage of as long as possible. CPSafety - Your online child passenger safety resource
Unfortunately current Australian car seats make it hard to extend rearfacing. Their weight limit only goes to 12kg for rear facing. Many babies reach this weight around 12 months. My son was 13kg at 11 months! USA and Canada have seats that rearface to 15 - 20kg. Sweden's go up to 25kg! New Zealand even have some that reach 18kg. But Australia is behind the times with 12kg!
There is a petition going that is attempting to bring rearfacing toddler seats to Australia. Please sign this to help keep our babies safe!
So basically, try to rear face your babies for as long as possible. It is so much safer for them! Please help Australia get up to date with car seat safety! If you have any questions, you can contact me on my personal facebook page https://www.facebook.com/rebekahboughton.
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Extended Rear Facing
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