Child Injury Risks at Daycare Facilities

When you drop off your child at a daycare facility each weekday morning, should you be worried about safety issues? According to a recent report from NBC News, there may be more child injury risks at daycare locations that most parents in San Diego would like to believe. Indeed, the article cites a recent report from the Inspector General’s Office of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), which “said that 96 percent of the 227 commercial day-care centers and in-home providers that its auditors visited were found to be in violation of at least one state safety or health regulation.”

When your child suffers a preventable daycare injury, you deserve to seek compensation. An experienced San Diego personal injury lawyer can assist with your case.

Infractions at Daycare Centers and Facilities

What should we learn from the HHS report? In short, childcare facilities may not be as safe for our kids as we want to think. As such, parents in Southern California and across the country may need to think twice before settling on a daycare facility to care for their kids.

Many of those facilities identified in the report did not just have a single infraction. Indeed, the article notes that “many had multiple infractions, including such shockingly obvious safety hazards as protruding rusty nails, dog feces in play areas, unlocked liquor accessible to kids, and filthy restroom facilities.” In addition to these salient problems, the HHS report also indicated that many daycare centers employ workers who have not undergone criminal background checks, which are supposed to be required for any employment of this type.

Of the employees assessed in the recent HHS report, there were 186 employees who were either working directly with kids or were near children at the facility, and had not undergone a required criminal background check.

Federal Government Attempting to Improve Childcare Facilities

For the last year or so, the federal government has been providing childcare subsidies so that parents in low-income families can afford childcare in order to work. In 2015, those subsidies totaled about $5.4 billion, and they helped to provide childcare for around 1.5 million kids. Much of these subsidies come from a reauthorization of the Child Care and Development Block Grant (CCDBG) Act, which occurred in 2014. But as the recent HHS report emphasizes, providing subsidies for childcare likely is not enough to ensure that those kids are getting adequate care.

The major issue, safety advocates point out, is that we do not have enough resources to monitor childcare facilities on a sufficiently regular basis. As such, parents need to look into the facilities where they are considering childcare, and they need to take action if they suspect their kids are not safe. Each state has its own resources for child care licensing and regulation, and parents can contact local offices if they have concerns about a particular daycare center.

Contact a San Diego Child Injury Lawyer

According to a fact sheet from Child Care Aware of America, there are currently more than 11,000 childcare centers in California alone. If you suspect that a childcare or daycare facility might not meet current safety regulations, or if your child got hurt while at a daycare facility, an experienced San Diego child injury lawyer can help. Contact the Walton Law Firm today for more information.

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