One child a week on average is being left in a locked car in Hoppers Crossing, the CFA says.
In the past three months, Hoppers Crossing CFA has been called to rescue about 12 children who have been left in vehicles.
Duty officer Geoff McGill said that while about 20 per cent of those calls were from parents who had accidentally locked their keys and child in a vehicle, the remaining calls were because parents had deliberately locked their children in while they shopped or ran errands.
“A lot of the calls are to shopping centre carparks and occasionally to residential areas,” he said.
“In my experience, it is too much hassle for parents to move their children to do their five minutes of shopping and come back, so they leave them in the car. ‘I was only popping in’ is the catch-cry.
“History has told us that children die in hot cars.”
Mr McGill urged parents to take the extra time needed to take their children out of their cars and into shops with them.
Mr McGill’s warning comes as new statistics from Ambulance Victoria reveal that across Wyndham paramedics were called to help 60 children locked in cars between September 1, 2013, and August 31 this year – up from 57 in the same period of 2012-13.
Hoppers Crossing had the highest number of call-outs in the municipality, with 18 incidents recorded by Ambulance Victoria. Werribee and Tarneit had 13 incidents each, while Point Cook had 11.
Ambulance Victoria group manager Brett Drummond said being left in hot cars could quickly become life-threatening for babies and young children.
“It doesn’t have to be a scorching hot day for the car to quickly heat up,” he said.
“You wouldn’t get out of the car after shopping and leave your ice-cream in the back seat, so why would you leave your children there?”
