2009 drownings second lowest on record – Water Safety NZ

Figures released today showed 98 people drowned last year, the second lowest annual toll since records began in 1980. Photo / Paul Estcourt

The 2009 drowning toll was the second lowest on record but Water Safety New Zealand is warning New Zealanders still need to learn to swim and take water safety courses.

Figures released today showed 98 people drowned last year, the second lowest annual toll since records began in 1980.

The average drowning toll for the decade 2000-2009 was also down, to 116 deaths each year, from 143 in the 1990s and 181 in the 1980s.

Despite the decline, New Zealand's drowning rate of 2.4 deaths per 100,000 is still twice that of Australia's.

The decline in drownings over three decades showed water safety was improving but the statistics could become worse if an epidemic of failing to learn to swim eventuated, warned Water Safety general manager Matt Claridge.

"Children must learn swim and survival skills or one day be faced with a life-threatening drowning incident."

The number of drownings associated with power boats rose to 12 from a five-year average of six, and diving deaths also rose to nine last year from five in 2008.

Recreational drownings were often driven by ignorance and a blase attitude to safety, leading to another high incidence of boating incidents and more males drowning than expected, Mr Claridge said.

Males made up 85 per cent of the deaths last year, up on the five-year average of 76 per cent.

Boaties should take a Coastguard Boating Education course and males should know what they were doing before they tried a new activity, he said.

Nine toddlers under the age of five drowned in 2009.

Maori made up 25 per cent of the deaths, up from the five-year average of 22 per cent, and Pacific Islanders made up 9 per cent, up from the five-year average of 7 per cent.

- NZPA