Children: Early Swim Lessons May Reduce Drowning

The idea might seem obvious, but some safety experts have raised concerns that teaching young children to swim may put them at higher risk by diminishing their natural fear of water or making their caregivers overconfident. The American Academy of Pediatrics, for example, recommends swimming lessons for children 5 and up but has not taken a position on lessons for younger children because not enough was known about their effect, the researchers note.

The study, which appears in The Archives of Pediatric & Adolescent Medicine, looked at drowning deaths of people ages 1 to 19 in six states over two years. Researchers compared the swimming experience of the victims with that of similarly aged children in the same county.

Led by Dr. Ruth A. Brenner of the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development, they found that swimming lessons did not increase the drowning risk for younger children and, in fact, seemed to decrease it.

But the authors cautioned that swimming lessons alone “will not prevent drowning and that even the most proficient swimmers can drown.”