Stay Safety Smart!(R) - Identify Home Hot Spots to Prevent Burn Hazards

Underwriters Laboratories (UL) is helping families stay safe from potential
home burn hazards this Fire Prevention Week

NORTHBROOK, Ill., Oct. 5 /PRNewswire/ -- Everyday household routines - such as
boiling water for the family dinner, giving your child a bath or leaving
burning candles within reach of a child - can potentially cause burns to you
or your child if not done safely. As part of this year's Fire Prevention Week
(Oct. 4 - 10, 2009), Underwriters Laboratories (UL) - the leading product
safety organization - is helping families identify potential burn hazards
around the home that parents may overlook, and providing them with
easy-to-remember burn prevention tips.

According to national burn statistics, approximately 2.4 million burn injuries
are reported every year. What's more, the kitchen, bathroom and living room
could be considered the home's top "hot spots," as four out of every five burn
incidents occur in one of these action-packed areas.

"It only takes a few seconds for a small child to grab a boiling pot of water
off a stove or a burning candle off a living room table," says John
Drengenberg, director of Consumer Safety at Underwriters Laboratories.
"Potential accidents - like fires and burns - may be just one distraction
away, but can be prevented if you consider safety in your family's everyday
routines. Identifying the burn hazards within your home's hot spots and taking
steps to minimize potential danger is another great step toward being Safety
Smart!®."

Home Hot Spot Highlight: Kitchen
One of the main hot spots in the kitchen is the stove top. If unsupervised,
curious children could suffer serious burns. To mitigate potential stove top
burn hazards, UL recommends:
-- Create a kid-free zone in the kitchen. Parents should keep kids about
three feet away from the stove - if possible - while cooking. Better
yet, parents could have children do homework or chores to earn
allowance
to keep them out of the kitchen altogether while preparing meals.

-- Keep the pots in back. Cook on the back burners. Never leave a pot on
the stove within reach of a child as children have a tendency to reach
up and grab anything in their line of sight.

Home Hot Spot Highlight: Bathroom
Hot tap water scald burns cause more deaths and hospitalizations than any
other type of hot liquid burn, like burns from coffee or hot soup. Tap water
burns happen most often in the bathroom and tend to be more severe and cover a
larger portion of the body than other scald burns. To lessen the potential of
getting burned by scalding bathroom tap water, UL recommends:
-- Set your water heater to 120 degrees F or less. To avoid accidental
scalds, make sure your water heater's temperature is set below 120
degrees F or set to "low." Anything above that temperature can cause
severe burns within seconds.

-- Test the bath water first. Before bath time, make sure your child's
bath
water isn't too hot. An adult should be able to place his or her arm
in
the water for 30 seconds without discomfort. If the water is too hot
for
you, it's too hot for your child. To cool the bath water down, run
some
cold water before your child gets in.

Home Hot Spot Highlight: Family Room
According to the National Fire Protection Association, candle fires cause
approximately 15,000 home fires a year. Additionally, in the U.S., an average
of seven children per day are treated in emergency rooms for injuries due to
unsafe interaction with electrical outlets. To decrease the chance of children
getting burned in the family room, UL recommends:
-- Blow out candles before leaving a room! Be aware of burning candles
throughout the house and always blow them out before leaving a room.
If
you have children or pets running around the house, a candle can
easily
be knocked down and start a fire.

-- Cover electrical outlets. Sticking things like fingers or toys into
an
electrical outlet can cause an electrical burn. Make sure to cover all
electrical outlets with outlet covers so children aren't tempted to
play
with them.

"For many, the psychological effects of burns can stay with you long after
scars fade," says Drengenberg. "Stay Safety Smart by using UL's burn
prevention tips and exercising extreme caution in and around your home's hot
spots."

For a complete burn prevention and fire safety check list, go to
www.ul.com/consumers.

About Underwriters Laboratories
Underwriters Laboratories (UL) is an independent product safety certification
organization that has been testing products and writing Standards for Safety
for over a century. UL evaluates more than 19,000 types of products,
components, materials and systems, with 20 billion UL Marks appearing on
72,000 manufacturers' products each year. UL's worldwide family of companies
and network of service providers includes 64 laboratory, testing and
certification facilities serving customers in 98 countries. For more
information, visit: http://www.ul.com/newsroom.

About Safety Smart!(®)
Keeping children safe by empowering them to be Safety Smart!® is the goal of
an ongoing public safety initiative by Underwriters Laboratories (UL) with the
assistance of various units of The Walt Disney Co. Safety Smart aims at
improving the awareness and understanding of children ages 4-14 in safety and
in consciously managing themselves and their surroundings to be as safe as
possible. The program cultivates safety awareness, provides opportunities for
children to learn and practice safe behaviors, and helps children make
informed safety choices today and in the future. For more information, visit:
http://www.ul.com/global/eng/pages/corporate/newsroom/storyideas/familysafety/safetysmart/

SOURCE Underwriters Laboratories

Joe Hirschmugl, Media Relations Manager of Underwriters Laboratories,
+1-847-664-1508, Joseph.F.Hirschmugl@us.ul.com; or Tina Janczura Stanton of
GolinHarris, +1-312-729-4349, tjanczura@golinharris.com, for Underwriters
Laboratories