Child drowning prevention group holds awareness event; 2017 a tough year

Child drowning prevention educators hope 2018 is not a repeat of last year, where three children in Collier County succumbed to drowning with heartache that persists for the families.

“We haven’t seen three drownings in a long time,” Paula DiGrigoli, executive director of the NCH Safe & Healthy Children’s Coalition of Collier County, said. The average for the three years prior, from 2014 to 2016, was two drowning deaths a year.

But tragedy struck early this year, causing a vigil Friday evening on Vanderbilt Beach — to remember all of the local children who have died by drowning — to be especially difficult.

Two children died inside a submerged vehicle in Immokalee on Jan. 7 when a minivan driven by their mother swerved off the road and landed in a pond near Eden Avenue and Apple Street.

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The bodies of 3-year-old Ra' Layah Johnson, and her 5-year-old brother, Ra'Majesty Johnson, were found inside the minivan. The body of their mother, Shatoria Brown, 27, was found on the bank of the pond.

The coalition is stepping up efforts to educate families about water safety for children; how seconds can turn into tragedy if adults become distracted when children are near bodies of water.

Friday’s vigil, in its fifth year, was co-sponsored by Just Against Children Drowning Foundation Inc., which was started by Port Charlotte resident Paul DeMello in 2010. He lost his 13-month-old twin sons, Joshua and Christian, in 2010 after a backyard pool tragedy in Port Charlotte. Joshua died at a hospital; Christian was revived but died three days later.

Christian’s kidneys were donated to a young woman in Sarasota and his liver was donated to a boy in Texas, DeMello, 49, said.

“It was the first time I smiled and cried,” he said Friday before the vigil, recalling his grief eight years ago and when he learned his son’s kidneys helped save another life. He finds comfort knowing something good for other families was possible from his loss.

His foundation works with the state Department of Children and Families to provide fencing around unfenced pools and alarms, and to teach cardiopulmonary resuscitation and swimming.

“Our main thing is the fencing,” DeMello said. “We really believe in keeping those little feet solid on the ground.”

Dr. Todd Vedder, a local pediatrician and adviser to the Collier coalition, said he addresses water safety with parents all the time in his practice. At the vigil, he spoke about the life-saving measures of alarms for doors to backyard pools, even at community pools where the lock at the gate at the fence may be broken. He demonstrated the alarm at the vigil, to show how the sound can carry. 

"That sound is music to my ears because that sound may save a child's life," Vedder said. 

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The Collier safe children’s coalition created a bereavement task force in October to put together a resource guide for grieving families, to help them rebuild their lives after the loss of a child, DiGrigoli said.

Drowning is the leading cause of death among children aged 1 to 4 in Florida, according to the Florida Department of Health. Statewide, 80 children died by drowning in 2017. In Collier, 44 youngsters have drowned since 2000.

In previous years, the coalition used paper lanterns for the candlelight vigil and mile-long walk along the beach; this year supporters went to Pottery Painting Studio in Naples and painted ceramic lanterns for each of the 44 local lives lost, DiGrigoli said.

The group had to paint the last one after two-year-old Elizabeth Sebastion drowned Dec. 30, 2017, in a pool in Immokalee.

The two other local children who died in 2017 are 2-year-old Peter Mitchell, who passed away Oct. 3 from drowning in a pond behind his family’s home in East Naples; and 4-year-old Saijene Kernizan Black, who died July 3 in a neighbor’s pool, according to police reports.

The coalition and several local Coast Guard Auxiliary Flotillas joined together several years ago for a life jacket loaner program at a dozen or more local beaches. The coalition provides water safety advice that emphasizes protective layers around bodies of water, which include uninterrupted adult supervision, door alarms on sliding glass doors to outdoor pools, gate locks at pools, and the use of life jackets.

For more information, the coalition’s website is at www.SafeHealthyChildren.org or 624-4033.