TASC notes with sadness the tragic drowning deaths of three girls in the Phitsanulok Province, Thailand last week.

An online Thai-language news article reported that the ten-year-old girls were playing with other three friends in a pond in the province when they got into difficulty. One of the friends reportedly sought help from their brother who was playing nearby, but he did not know how to save them. By the time the village herdsman was summoned to help find the girls, all three had drowned.

Unfortunately, this is not an isolated incident in Thailand. Thousands of children die every year in drowning accidents.

As with many cases where children drown, other children are the first summoned to help. TASC understands there was no warning sign near the pond and none of the children were aware of survival swimming techniques. Simple and cost-effective survival swimming classes do save lives. This latest accident not only claimed three lives, but undoubtedly has irrevocably changed the lives of the nearby children who witnessed the deaths and didn’t have the knowledge and skills to be able to help.

TASC would like to see survival swimming become a part of every child’s life in Asia so tragedies such as this one can be avoided in the future.