This strikes me as one of those unintended consequences that you just don’t quite think about until you hear about it: your TV can fall and cause serious harm or even death to your child. Not to be alarmist, but death by TV is on the rise.
When we bought a large flat screen TV awhile ago we gave away our other one – you know the kind with the tube that is so front heavy. I was briefly considering moving it to the bedroom on a little stand, but I’m opposed to a TV in the bedroom so we opted not to. The reason is I’d watch TV all the time if it was in the bedroom and that would just not be good!
So, out it went to a good home. But, thinking back, the piece of furniture I would have placed it on was pretty tall, kinda rickety and in general just old and unstable. That, apparently, is one of the causes for the rise of children’s deaths by falling TVs. Imagine this scenario – a child reaches up to touch the TV, pushes it accidentally, it rocks back and forth and comes crashing down, pinning your child to the floor.
It’s happening more and more these days. Scary, huh? And, it’s not just the old TVs relegated to unsuitable furniture. It’s the flat screens themselves, too. They are much heavier than old TVs and a tad more stable given that their weight is evenly distributed, but the trend these days is to have the TV down low in, you guessed it, easy reach of children.
The best thing to do is anchor your TV to the wall. Just pretend that you’re “earthquake proofing” your TV set…who says an earthquake has to arise from the earth’s core? That TV can move and shake for multiple reasons.
Having a stable table to place it on and teaching the children to NOT TOUCH are also good preventative measures, but I think having that big screen physically attached to the wall might just be the safest. There are many earthquake kits out there to choose from and it’s simpler than you might think.
Oh, and while you’re at it, check out the earthquake straps for bookshelves – same principle applies!
photo credit: adactio
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