Why That Lollypop Can Endanger Your Child's Life

When your baby starts to crawl, you quickly race around, babyproofing the whole house. "Don't drop that penny!" you scream, scrambling over to save your baby.

But as that baby grows older and starts to eat solid foods, it's easy to let up on your paranoia. After all, once your child is three years old, you can tell that she can chew well, right? So what could be the harm in feeding her absolutely anything at all, from popcorn to peanuts to lollypops?

Turns out chewing ability isn't the issue. I recently interviewed Dr. Tony Kille, an otolaryngologist and professor at the University of Wisconsin, about choking hazards. He explained that even when a child’s second set of molars begin to come in, after age two, they are still developmentally unable to manage certain foods well. In time, a child will need to learn how to manipulate the food safety with her lips, tongue, and the rest of her mouth. So the whole "but I can see that she knows how to chew well" excuse just doesn't hold water.

And choking is a real hazard, one that can have severe aftereffects, including brain damage and death. One study in the August 2013 issue of Pediatrics analyzed data collected from emergency rooms around the country between the years 2001 and 2009. It found that about 12,400 children below age 15 are treated in emergency rooms each year for non-fatal choking. Sixty-two percent of these cases involved children under age six.

The most common cause of choking was hard candy (yes, that includes lollypops that were accidentally/intentionally sucked off the stick), which was the culprit in 16 percent of the incidents. Other types of candy caused another 13 percent, meat (other than hot dogs) caused 12 percent, bones caused 12 percent, and fruits and vegetables caused 10 percent.

Think that choking isn't such a big deal? Ten percent of the cases analyzed required hospitalization, and many of these also required a bronchoscopy, a hardcore surgical procedure.

So before you hand your child a hard candy, think twice. Do you really want to deal with the consequences?

Source: The New York Times. "Choking Still Sends Too Many Children to the ER." 7/31/13