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. 2020 Dec 14;7(12):291.
doi: 10.3390/children7120291.

Interventions for Child Drowning Reduction in the Indian Sundarbans: Perspectives from the Ground

Medhavi Gupta  1 , Sujoy Roy  2 , Ranjan Panda  2 , Pompy Konwar  3 , Jagnoor Jagnoor  3
Affiliations

Interventions for Child Drowning Reduction in the Indian Sundarbans: Perspectives from the Ground

Medhavi Gupta et al. Children (Basel). .

Abstract

Drowning is a leading cause of child death in the coastal Sundarbans region of India due to the presence of open water, lack of supervision and poor infrastructure, but no prevention programs are currently implemented. The World Health Organization has identified interventions that may prevent child drowning in rural low-and middle-income country contexts, including the provision of home-based barriers, supervised childcare, swim and rescue training and first responder training. Child health programs should consider the local context and identify barriers for implementation. To ensure the sustainability of any drowning prevention programs implemented, we conducted a qualitative study to identify the considerations for the implementation of these interventions, and to understand how existing government programs could be leveraged. We also identified key stakeholders for involvement. We found that contextual factors such as geography, cultural beliefs around drowning, as well as skillsets of local people, would influence program delivery. Government programs such as accredited social health activists (ASHAs) and self-help groups could be leveraged for program implementation, while Anganwadi centres would require additional support due to poor resourcing. Gaining government permissions to change Anganwadi processes to provide childcare services may be challenging. The results showed that adapting drowning programs to the Sundarbans context presents unique challenges and program customisation.

Keywords: India; child health; drowning; implementation science; injury; low-and middle-income country; preventative medicine; qualitative research.

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Conflict of interest statement

The authors declare no conflict of interest. The funders had no role in the design of the study; in the collection, analyses, or interpretation of data; in the writing of the manuscript, or in the decision to publish the results.

Figures

Figure 1
Figure 1
Key contextual enablers and barriers to implementation identified by participants.
Figure 2
Figure 2
Stakeholder placement in Mendelow’s Matrix.
See this image and copyright information in PMC

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