- "..more than 3,300 children aged
5 to 14 were treated in emergency rooms last year for injuries related
to bookbags."
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- ATLANTA (AP) -- With a 20-pound backpack strapped to her back, 9-year-old
Shana Berkeley looks as if she could be toppled by a gust of wind.
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- She insists she needs all that "stuff"
in the pack, but it's so heavy, she frequently can't lift it.
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- So sometimes she just rolls her stuff.
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- Shana is like many students who are lugging
their increasingly heavy loads in luggage carts or bookbags with built-in
wheels, which are the latest twists in school gear because they help some
50-pound pupils handle loads half their weight.
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- It may look cute, but pediatricians say
it's a serious matter -- schoolchildren should not haul more than 10 percent
to 20 percent of their own body weight.
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- The Consumer Product Safety Commission
estimates more than 3,300 children aged 5 to 14 were treated in emergency
rooms last year for injuries related to bookbags.
-
- "It typically puts them off balance
and gives them a posture that promotes low back pain," said Wayne
Yankus of the American Academy of Pediatrics' Committee on School Health.
"A lot of kids don't suffer it immediately, but over the long run
they might."
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- The risk of spinal damage became such
a concern two years ago in Bangkok, Thailand, that the education ministry
imposed weight limits on bookbags. The ministry found that almost half
of primary school pupils were found to be carrying bags weighing more than
6 pounds.
-
- There are no such weight limits at Centennial
Place Elementary School in Atlanta, where many of the youngsters rely on
wheels to transport all the textbooks and school supplies needed to get
through the day.
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- "I have my notebook and my math
book and my spelling list and my pencils and my, and my, um, permission
slip and my clothes," says 9-year-old Jasmine Dobbs, rattling off
the contents of her red, yellow and blue mini-suitcase that weighs at least
15 pounds.
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- Many pediatricians say the main problem
is not the weight of the bookbags, but how the children carry them.
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- Some youngsters wear backpacks too low
on their backs or sling only one strap across a shoulder. Physicians recommend
both straps should be worn so that the backpack is close to the body and
its weight is distributed evenly across the back and shoulders.
-
- Reasons for the growing trend of overpacked
sacks range from mere fashion to tougher academic regimens. And in some
schools, the pupils don't have lockers or don't have time between classes
to get to lockers.
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- In addition to getting a lot of homework,
many children head to after-school programs and need their books to study
and a pair of extra clothes to play in, said Centennial principal Cynthia
Kuhlman.
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- "The bags are getting bigger everywhere.
We just have them on wheels," she said.
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- Heather Paul, executive director of the
National Safe Kids campaign, said many pupils just keeping adding books
to the sacks without taking out items they really don't need.
-
- "It would probably also be safe
to say the taste and the status that comes with the pack is driving them
to carry more of a load," she said. "Small children want to act
like big kids, so acting like a big kid means carrying a bigger backpack
and more books."
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