Jan 5, 2024 at 5:00 PM Update: 2 hours ago
There were slightly fewer fireworks victims during the past New Year’s Eve than during the previous New Year’s Eve. But the share of victims who ended up in the emergency room due to heavy illegal fireworks increased. These explosives caused many more victims, especially among teenagers.
This is evident from figures from VeiligheidNL. During the New Year, 1,212 fireworks victims reported to the emergency department (ED) or a GP emergency post. That was 1,253 last year.
Of all fireworks victims this year, 365 people had to go straight to the emergency room. Nearly three in ten of these victims ended up in the emergency room due to an incident involving heavy, illegal fireworks. These could be mortar bombs, nitrates and cobras, for example. These incidents also led to slightly more amputations than at the turn of the previous year.
“A very worrying development is that an increase was particularly visible in the age category twelve to fifteen years,” SafetyNL continues. More than one in three victims of heavy, illegal fireworks fell into that age category. That share was ‘only’ 13 percent last year.
In any case, things often went wrong with young people. More than half of all fireworks victims were younger than twenty years old. The figures also show that men and boys made up three quarters of all victims.
Plastic surgeons also treated more young victims around New Year’s Eve. And the injuries were more serious than in other years, the Dutch Association for Plastic Surgery (NVPC) said earlier this week.
Ophthalmologists are treating 156 people with eye injuries caused by fireworks during New Year’s Eve, preliminary figures showed on Friday. A year earlier there were still 133.
‘Very worrying’
Despite the slight decrease in the total number of fireworks victims, SafetyNL still speaks of a “very worrying” situation. This is due to the increase in the number of accidents involving heavy, illegal fireworks.
“It shows once again the devastating effect fireworks can have when things go wrong,” says director Martijntje Bakker. “It is illegal for a reason, and it concerns us extra that a young group of victims apparently have or will have the means to obtain these fireworks.”
In addition to investigation and enforcement, the organization therefore advocates more information, especially for young people.
The NVPC and the professional association of ophthalmologists – the Dutch Ophthalmic Society (NOG) – want the government to ban consumer fireworks and tackle illegal fireworks.
2024-01-05 18:15:58
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