‘Be Seen, Not Hurt’
Child Brain Injury Trust CEO rounds up a week of campaign activity
Here at the Child Brain Injury Trust we’re passionate about the families of brain injured children that we support across the UK, but we’re also passionate about promoting safety and awareness in the hope of preventing more children acquiring a serious injury as a result of an accident.
Many of the families we have supported over the past 22 years have a child who has acquired their brain injury as the result of an accident, either crossing the road, whilst cycling or as a passenger in a car.
Road accidents involving children have a devastating effect on a family, and are sadly still all too common. The aim of our week long ‘Be Seen, Not Hurt’ campaign was to highlight the dangers of roads as we head into the darker nights of winter once the clocks go back. We aimed our message at school age children, and focused on staying safe whilst cycling, scooting, skating and crossing roads, and we encouraged children, and adults, to always wear a helmet whilst taking part in certain activities.
It is not a new message, but it is an important message, and it is the first time we have concentrated on road safety in this way with such a targeted campaign. We have been really pleased with the response from families, schools, businesses and individuals who got involved and helped spread the word.
Our teams across the country worked hard all week, and in the weeks running up, to promote this campaign. They have been talking to hundreds of children in schools all over the country, from reception classes and nurseries through to secondary school children. They have also been busy handing out thousands of reflective ‘slap wrap’ bands, thanks to our campaign sponsor Thompson Solicitors who funded them.
It was a busy week too with social media. It has been great to hear the stories of families who have been affected by a brain injury, and from people passionate about promoting the use of safety helmets for cycling and other sports.
Please continue to share the stories and messages from the campaign to as many people as you can. If you’d like to support our work, please send a text donation to 70070. Simply text CBIT13 £10 (or whatever amount you’d like to donate).
We are not stopping now, we’ll continue to promote safety and awareness throughout the year, and we will be using lots of the resources and messages that we have developed for this campaign every time we go out and visit schools.
Thank you to everyone who has supported this important campaign, and don’t forget, if you want any further information about the work of the charity, or safety and prevention, please get in touch and we’ll be very happy to talk to you.