Foundation Prioritizes Summer Camp Legislation and Drowning Research in ‘24
2024 TOP PRIORITIES
DROWNING PREVENTION
Behavioral research to explore the impact of adult lapses in supervision and adolescent brain development on child drowning
State-by-State Child Death Review research to track trends and epidemiology
Integrated public school education campaign
Lifeguard certification company review and assessment
SUMMER CAMP HARM PREVENTION
Reintroduce federal legislation on the 50th anniversary of its original introduction
Pass California’s first comprehensive bill currently on the Governor’s desk
Education and advocacy campaign with new alliance partner Child USA
Release nationwide curriculum and training program with Beau Biden Foundation
Release documentary film about this dark American secret of camp harm
The first state-by-state review of current camp safety laws
Work with the CDC, AAP and other agencies to track harm and promote prevention
First development phase of camp harm archive
LOS ANGELES — Meow Meow Foundation (MMF) has vowed to shake things up in its 2024 organizational plan, including a strategic departure from its allies in childhood drowning prevention and an attempt to reintroduce a federal summer camp safety bill on the 50th anniversary of its original introduction by a former U.S. Vice President.
As the child health and safety nonprofit approaches its fifth anniversary, change and challenge will serve as defining factors in its mission to minimize harm.
“History can be an invaluable teacher,” said MMF President Doug Forbes. “I’ve taken a long, hard look at where we started compared to where we stand, and although there’s pride in progress, considerable tactical shifts are needed.”
One of those shifts, Forbes said, is to emphasize harm prevention research perhaps even more than primarily providing resources.
DROWNING PREVENTION
“The National Drowning Prevention Alliance, government agencies and NGOs perennially shape aquatics safety policies around swim lessons, preventative barriers and cursory education,” Forbes said. “To me that’s a form of denial therapy, largely because most young children drown due to a lapse in proper supervision and older children drown due to an apparent lapse in judgment.”
Forbes said he is especially disturbed by a growing fascination with Infant Swim Rescue (ISR), where children as young as 6 months are forced to learn how to save themselves from drowning.
“Putting the onus of drowning prevention on an infant is more than a bit ridiculous,” said pediatrician Clay Jones who researched ISR. “It is dangerous to believe that any toddler, and certainly any mobile infant, will reliably perform these skills when falling into a pool and not immediately lifted up by a caregiver or lifeguard.”
Forbes could not agree more. “It’s long overdue for adults to finally step up and hold themselves accountable instead of deflecting from their role in the childhood drowning epidemic. Putting the onus of drowning prevention on young children is much more than ridiculous, it’s inexcusable and even lethal.”
The National Drowning Prevention Alliance recently promoted a nonprofit that specializes in ISR, despite previously withholding support for ISR due to an utter dearth of research regarding its efficacy.
An American Academy of Pediatrics policy statement previously recommended swim lessons were efficacious only for children four years and older but changed its tune based on one limited research study.
The American Red Cross stated that limited evidence exists to support the idea that swim lessons before age 4 may provide drowning prevention benefits. Yet, despite having its own Scientific Advisory Council, the Red Cross has not posited any evidence to support its policy of deploying adolescents as lifeguards.
“Frankly, I’m extremely frustrated by purported expert aquatics agencies and nonprofits that dish the same old conflicted policies based on anecdotes or paper-thin research instead of current, robust evidence on how to slay this perennial childhood drowning beast. The facts are that kids under 9 are drowning at the same rates year over year despite all of the same interventions recommended by all of these same gatekeepers.”
Doug Forbes
Forbes said MMF will develop an intensive drowning prevention follow-up study based on his behavior-centered assessment from 2021, including inattentional blindness and brain development concerns that factor into the vast majority of childhood drowning. The goal of the study is to develop a policy statement that fuels new interventions.
Forbes said that MMF’s other drowning prevention initiative will coincide with Roxie’s Wish: Drowning Prevention Week for Children.
MMF passed a perennial statewide (CA) resolution in 2021 under the same name, which leverages the third week of every May — before Memorial Day — to distribute drowning prevention education and awareness campaigns in honor of Forbes’ late daughter who drowned at a summer camp.
In 2024, MMF plans to coordinate a statewide advertising campaign with drowning prevention education materials distributed throughout all public school districts. The mission is to compel children and parents to discuss and plan drowning prevention efforts in earnest immediately prior to summer swim season. Forbes said he hopes to roll out the campaign nationally by 2025.
SUMMER CAMP HARM PREVENTION
Aquatics safety stakeholders abound, but MMF is the only camp harm prevention foundation in the nation, despite the fact that the camp industry is a $26 billion colossus that serves 26 million children, employs 1.5 (largely youth) workers and accommodates roughly 30,000 operations.
Forbes said, “Pervasive, enduring sexual and physical harm at summer camps is a dark American secret, and this is why I was gobsmacked when I discovered that MMF is the only summer camp harm prevention foundation in the nation.”
Forbes has spent the last year traveling the U.S. as he directs a documentary about this issue. He has interviewed local, state and federal politicians, social scientists, camp experts and operators, attorneys, victims of camp harm and families of children who died at camps.
He said that most parents and guardians are either under-informed or misinformed about camp oversight.
The American Camp Association (ACA) is a camp lobby group masquerading as an education org. The ACA claims that 80% of states license and oversee day camps while 84% of states license and oversee overnight (resident) camps. These claims are not true.
What is true is that the ACA has aggressively lobbied against camp safety legislation since the 1960s. The organization and its affiliates — such as the Christian Camp and Conference Association and Boy Scouts of America — have a clear record of relentlessly protecting the interests of camps, not the safety of campers.
In contrast to ACA claims, our research shows:
56% of states license day camps
58% license overnight (resident) camps
70% of states do not mandate camp health supervision
76% do not mandate certifications in high-risk activities, i.e. gun ranges, zip lines, aquatics, etc.
88% of states don't inspect anything other than basic building code, fire and food requirements
72% of states don't require Emergency Action Plans
66% of states don't require any particular aquatics safety protocols
68% don't specifically mention that they require background checks to help prevent sexual harm
In 1974, then-senator Walter Mondale — who became VP under President Carter — introduced the Children and Youth Camp Safety Act. The American Camp Association and the Boy Scouts of America successfully lobbied against the federal bill and seven iterations thereafter.
The tragic irony of these lobbying efforts is not lost upon Forbes and MMF.
“The Boy Scouts of America — a Christian-based youth organization — is responsible for the most horrific child sexual abuse campaign in U.S. history, the majority of which took place at summer camps and meetings, according to a Child USA report” Forbes said. “Yet, here is this organization fighting with all of its might to deny protections for children while the American Camp Association refuses to denounce the Boy Scouts for the mass suffering it caused at summer camps.”
This is why Forbes is especially determined to reintroduce Mondale’s federal Camp Safety Act on the 50th anniversary of its original introduction. In the interim, MMF also has a camp safety bill on CA Governor Newsom’s desk, which is the organization’s third attempt in four years to finally license and regulate all camps.
California is the most populous state in the nation and known for its robust regulatory environment. Of all states, California likely houses the most camps. Yet, the ACA, Boy Scouts and other lobby groups have stifled camp safety legislation for decades.
To date, California does not require any camp to be licensed, does not require operators to possess child care experience, does not require staff to be certified in high-risk activities, does not require staff to be certified in CPR and First Aid, and does not require proof of background checks.
MMF’s other camp-related initiatives include a newly formed alliance with Child USA to eliminate sexual abuse at camps and extend statutes of limitation so that survivors can report years if not decades after their abuse. The vast majority of survivors do not report abuse because they are intimidated, ashamed or unaware of norms because they are so young. The average age of males who do report such abuse is 52, which often follows a life of mental health challenges and addiction.
MMF will also introduce a nationwide camp safety curriculum and training program with alliance partner, The Beau Biden Foundation. Beau was not only the son of the nation’s president but also Delaware Attorney General who invested a great deal of time on child protection issues.
Although not funded by MMF, Forbes’ camp documentary will serve as a public education tool to help parents make better informed decisions and assist governments and NGOs with safety policies.
“Swimming is the fourth most popular recreational sport activity in the U.S. and approximately 25-30% of children will attend a camp at some point,” Forbes said. “Although our mission is of a David versus Goliath scale, this nation cannot continue to subject its most precious cargo to this magnitude of preventable harm.”