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Being held around the world today, Thursday 22nd June, the World's Largest Swimming Lesson event is again setting out to build awareness about the vital importance of teaching children to swim to help prevent drowning.

Today marks the eighth year for the global event and organisers have set their sights on a new goal – reaching more than one billion around the world with their message that ‘Swimming Lessons Save Lives™’ by 2019.

Local WLSL events are occurring at hundreds of locations in more than 20 different countries on five continents over the course of 24 hours with the aim of providing children and parents with exposure to life-saving water safety skills and increased awareness about the vital importance of teaching children to swim to help prevent drowning.

Organisers the World Waterpark Association are working to ‘connect the dots’ between the real risk of childhood drowning and the need for basic water competency skills and crucial parental supervision to keep kids safe in and around the water.

Research shows:

• In the USA, drowning remains the leading cause of unintended, injury related death for children ages between one and four years, and the second leading cause for children under 14; drowning is an even greater threat in other countries around the world.
• Many lack basic swimming skills: In 2014, a survey completed by the American Red Cross found more than half of all Americans (54%) either can't swim or don't have all of the basic swimming skills.
• Parents don't recognise supervision is key: According to a 2016 Safe Kids Worldwide report, despite the fact that lack of supervision played a role in the majority of drowning deaths, less than half of parents (49%) indicate they remain within arms' reach of their child in the water.

The WLSL event provides more than 20,000 man hours of water safety training in a single day to help teach participants basic water competency skills and educate parents about how to keep children safer in and around the water.

The WLSL was created as a platform for the aquatics industry to build awareness about the fundamental importance of teaching children to swim to prevent drowning. Since its inception, more than 195,000 children and adults have participated in WLSL lessons generating more than half a billion life-saving media impressions.

For more information go to www.WLSL.org.

Image: A young swimmer practices opening her eyes underwater during the 2016 World's Largest Swimming Lesson.

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