The best activity of the summer season to get relax is swimming. Many people like to use mermaid tails during swimming. It is mainly used by the kids and the young generation, especially for fun. Previously mermaid tails were available only for the kids and were only used for fun and safe water toys. But today you can get mermaid tail even for the adults and in many places, people use mermaid tail for hardcore swimming purpose.

Do Mermaid Tails increase drowning risk?

Mermaid tail is actually developed for putting a little bit of spice in the swimming adventure. There are some best mermaid tails for adults in the market that are even designed with fins. These fins enable the swimmer to glide effortlessly through the water in the same way what the real mermaid does. Apart from that, nowadays you will get a lot of mermaid tails which are brightly coloured.it comes up with scale-like patterns so that you can imitate the real image of a mermaid. Moreover, mermaid tails are found in a variety of sizes and you can choose it as per your necessity. Hence mermaid tails are now very demanding in the market. But the biggest question is – whether the use of mermaid tail safe or does it increases the risk of drowning.

What researcher has to say about the use of Mermaid tails?

When it comes to the use of mermaid tail the first question that arises in our mind is whether it comes with some added safety features or it increases the risk of drowning. Hence, several types of research have been performed on the use of the mermaid tail from time to time.

As per the research was done by Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC), it was found that the use of mermaid tail reduces the ability to swim to almost 70 percent and hence mermaid tail can dramatically increase the chances of drowning. In 2015, the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC) come up with a video as a public service announcement. In that video, a young girl was shown who wore the mermaid tail and tried to swim in a swimming pool in the US. The young girl got stuck upside down underwater in the backyard swimming pool as she was unable to move her legs while swimming and was almost drowning. But luckily her mother noticed it quickly and saved the girl from drowning. This video went viral and from this incident, it can be clearly said that use of mermaid tails can increase the risk of drowning.

Apart from that, Lauren Nimmo who was the senior health promotion and research manager of the Royal Life Saving Society of WA (RLSSWA) conducted a research study for testing the swimming skills of children who were aged in between 2 to 12 years. In this research, she allowed some children to wear the mermaid tail and find and kept some children free from the mermaid tails. From this research, Lauren Nimmo found that mermaid tails significantly reduces the capacity of the child’s movement in the water. This happened because mermaid tails are quite binding which holds the legs of the swimmer together and reduced their capacity to move in the water. As such the chance of drowning increases and reduces their ability to swim.

Apart from that, it is also seen from the research that the children who used the mermaid tails and fins got tired more quickly than that of those children who were swimming naturally without mermaid tails. Tiredness is certainly a great factor that increases the risk of drowning tragedy. Thus this study of RLSSWA highlights the extent how mermaid tails can reduce the ability of the children to swim and increase the tiredness more quickly and how children can drown in a short period of time.

Again Lauren Nimmo also observed that there a number of children who feel so unsafe while wearing the mermaid tails that they do not want to get into the water. As such Lauren Nimmo said that the product mermaid tails are of no use and do not help in swimming in any sense rather it increases the risk of drowning to a huge extent. So, Lauren Nimmo advises the parents not to encourage the children to wear mermaid tails even though the manufacturer claims it to be safe.

David Hillyard, who was WA’s Consumer Protection Commissioner, said that since children always find it hard to swim in the water and by wearing mermaid tails and fins we further increase their risk of drowning. It is found that 75 percent of the children want to wear mermaid tails only because of fun. Again David Hillyard found a number of evidence which shows that the product can increase the chance of drowning while wearing mermaid tail and fins. That is the reason why David Hillyard recommends not using mermaid tails and fins while swimming until and unless the mermaid tails are of the best quality and you are an expert swimmer.

Conclusion

Hence it is that mermaid tails do increases the risk of the drowning and as such kids should not use it while swimming on river, beach or lake. However, there is no official guideline regarding the sale and wear of mermaid tails. But still, it is advisable for the parent to do not encourage their children to wear mermaid tails during their initial period of swimming. However, you can allow your children to wear mermaid tails only in the supervised environment such as a swimming pool under the control of the instructor.

Author Biography

Phillips Dawson is the author of this article. He has done his M. Phil from Harvard University and has more than 10 years’ experience in the field of content writing. He has written numerous articles on swimming accessories and performed case studies on the best mermaid tails for adults and provides an experts opinion on the same.