Safe Kids

SILVIS, ILLINOIS - Each of the 276 students at Buffalo Elementary School, Buffalo, Iowa, will start their summer vacations with a new bike helmet and information to keep them safe on their bikes.

The gift was made possible thanks to the Quad Cities Safe Kids “All Heads Covered’ program and a donation from Genesis Health System. The Genesis, Illini Campus is the lead sponsor of Quad Cities Safe Kids.

Keene Hart, director of Quad Cities Safe Kids, said the idea of the “All Heads Covered’’ program is to promote bicycle safety and prevent injuries.

“Thanks to the generous support of sponsors in the past, and again this year with the support of Genesis, we’re in our 10th year of this program and have given away more than 10,000 helmets,’’ he said. “Not only is it an excellent safety program, it’s just a lot of fun to give out the helmets and see the fun the kids are having.’’

Each year, more than 500,000 people in the United States are treated in emergency departments, and more than 700 people die as a result of bicycle-related injuries. Children are at particularly high risk, accounting for more  than half of all bicyclerelated injuries seen in United States emergency departments.

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