Infant’s death sparks call for parents to be more attentive

Teddy Bear Foundation’s Shaheda Omar says parents should pay careful attention to their children, who attend day care centres and schools, to avoid missing red flags of the facilities which their children are enrolled in.

Omar believes that when enough attention is afforded to kids, signs always reveal themselves of whether a child is entrusted to the right hands.

“Check in on the child in the morning and remind them that if anything happens, if anybody hurts them, or if anybody makes them feel unsafe, they need to speak about it,” she adds.

Her comments come as a Boksburg family reels from the horror of losing their four-month-old infant, who perished at a day-care centre after choking on bottled milk.

The police have opened an inquest docket into the tragedy.

Omar reiterates that engaging in regular dialogues with children regarding their feelings and thoughts, should be every parent and guardian’s responsibility.

The counsellor and child rights activist says it is every nursery school’s responsibility to ensure the safety and well-being of children by appropriately and adequately supervising them, irrespective of their location within the facility’s compound/yard.

While acknowledging that some parents are forced by circumstances to take enroll their infants at daycare centres, Omar advises that those who can wait – should only take their children to creche when they start developing vocabulary abilities.

“Ideally, a child at the age of two and a half years where they have an exploratory nature to go out and explore everything, to identify object and to and ask questions,” she says.

She also advises parents to ensure that they enroll their children in registered nursery centres and ECD (Early Childhood Development) facilities.

She says they should also check whether child minders at the facilities have been vetted under the Children’s and Sexual Offences Acts, which clears them to work with children.

“Parents and guardians must look out and check out and also make physical sight visits to their children’s facilities of care in terms of safe-guarding measures on how conducive the environment is for the child,” adds Omar.

She says engaging in dialogues with parents of other kids within the facilities about their children’s’ experience there could also guide them about how safe a facility is for their little ones. Written by Odirile Rabolao