Doctors, vets warn about leaving children & pets in cars

JACKSON, Tenn. — With summer just around the corner, temperatures are rising and cars are heating up.

“Early spring is still a dangerous time, potentially for pets left in their car,” Cindy Schmidt, a veterinarian at North Madison Animal Hospital, said.

But it’s not just pets you need to look out for. According to the safety organization Kids and Cars, 37 children die in hot cars each year.

“A child can overheat three to five times faster than an adult, so anything can become an emergency very quickly,” said Dr. Peter Gardner, medical director at Physicians Quality Care.

The inside temperature of a car can rise 20 degrees in two to five minutes, and 30 degrees in just 30 minutes.

And while both doctors and vets say rolling down the window or turning on the A/C might help, it’s better to be safe than sorry.

“When they do go with their owners anywhere, I would take them out of the car, put them on a leash if at all possible,” Schmidt said.

But hot car deaths aren’t all from children and pets being forgotten.

“Twenty-seven percent of car deaths are from kids getting into an unlocked car and suffocating,” Gardner said. “So always keep your car locked.”

If you do come upon a pet or child locked inside a car, what should you do?

“Call 911 immediately,” Tom Mapes, spokesman for the Madison County Sheriff’s Office, said. “Main reason is we’ve got the tools and the medical supplies there to react quickly and to do something about that incident.”

There is a Good Samaritan law that allows you to break the window of a locked car if there is a child or pet inside, but you are required to call 911 before breaking the window.