The Epidemiology Of Unintentional Inland Water Drownings In The United Kingdom.

Abstract

Abstract Introduction Inland water sites are the most common location for drowning in Great Britain. In the 13 years from 1989 to 2001, 3,556 people have drowned in the lakes, reservoirs, rivers, streams and canal. The purpose of this paper is to examine the demography, geography, timing and cause of these drownings. Data and Methods Data was drawn from the RoSPA and RLSS UK Drowning statistics. Deaths recorded as suicide were excluded. Population based rates were calculated using the 1991 census data Results 81.1% (2,877) were male and 18.9% (673) were female. The highest average annual incidence rates were for males aged over 80 years (1.32 per 100,000 per year). Incidence is higher between May and August. 63.9% (2,268) of drownings occurred in rivers, 23.0 % (815) in lakes and 12.6% (449) in canals. The highest count of people who drowned were aged 15 – 29 , 93.3% (854) were male, of these 35.4% (302) got into difficulties whilst in the water, 12.4% (115) mentioned involvement of alcohol, and 11.4% (97) were in a vehicle that entered water. There is a significant correlation between Regions with more kilometres of linear features and the number of drownings (spearman rho=0.817, p<0.01). Conclusion Inland water drowning is a predominantly male phenomenon. Causation provide a mixture of results, the main issue being that if there was no witness, no knowledge of causation and no chance of rescue. It is seasonal with consistently more drownings in the warmer months and the holiday periods. Canals appear to have higher incident rate than rivers. More work needs to be undertaken in regard to the location and time of drowning to fill the gaps in our knowledge and is vital to prevention strategies.