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Never Leave Kids in Cars

Never leave your most precious valuables, your children, alone in the car.

On this page:

The Never Leave Kids in Cars campaign prompts parents to take their kids with them whenever they get out of the car, just as they do their everyday valuables, to avoid potentially tragic consequences.

Watch the Kid Safe videoExternal Link on Vimeo.

Never Leave Kids in Cars ambassadors Samantha Gash and Mark Wales both know the importance of never leaving their son Harry in the car. Sam and Mark have trained their bodies to endure some of the harshest conditions, but babies and children are far more sensitive to the heat.

Risk of heatstroke and dehydration

  • a child’s body temperature rises three to five times faster than an adults'
  • even on a mild day, the temperature inside a parked car can be 20 to 30 degrees hotter than the temperature outside
  • when it’s 30 degrees outside, a child could be suffering in up to 60-degree heat
  • leaving the windows down has little effect on the inside temperature of the car
  • large cars heat up as quickly as smaller cars.

For more information, see: Kidsafe VictoriaExternal Link

Cost to families

In Victoria, it is against the law to leave a child unattended in a car. Penalties include:

  • fines, or
  • up to six months’ jail.

However, the cost to families can be far higher. Children can die in hot cars and the risk is highest in summer.

Fatal distraction

Fatal distraction occurs when parents or carers unknowingly leave their child in a car. It is a condition that impacts short-term memory capacity and can lead to serious injury or, in extreme cases, the death of a child.

Short-term memory is used for temporary information, like reminding ourselves to pick up milk on the way home. When people become tired and stressed, short-term memory failure can cause habitual memory to take over.

For example, an exhausted parent may drive straight to work along their normal route rather than stopping to drop a child off at childcare, inadvertently leaving the child in the car when they arrive.

Fatal distraction can happen to anyone. The consequences can be devastating for parents and carers.

In recent times, there have been several incidents in Australia and around the world where parents or carers, believing a child to be elsewhere and safe, have unknowingly left a child in a car with tragic outcomes.

Watch the fatal distraction videoExternal Link on Vimeo.

Prevent fatal distraction

There are some steps that people can work into daily routines to help lower the risk of inadvertently leaving a child in a hot car:

  • open the back door of the car every time you park, even if there is no one in the back seat
  • place a child’s bag or cuddly toy in the front seat as a reminder
  • leave a bag, phone or wallet in the back seat of the car
  • use a mirror for rear facing car seats
  • create a mental list of things to check each time you leave the car, for example, ‘baby, keys, wallet and phone’
  • install electronic controls that create an audio reminder.

Resources

Translated resources

Reviewed 17 March 2022

Education

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