Yes, you read that correctly. Waze, a popular crowd-source traffic and navigation app for Android and iOS is testing an in-app reminder to grab your child from the back seat before you leave the vehicle. On one hand the feature is a welcome one, on the other, the fact that it needs to exist is pretty disheartening. An average of 37 children die each year in the US after their guardians, due to distraction or negligence, leave them inside vehicles for an extended period of time. On a hot 90 degree day, the temperature inside a car can soar to a life-threatening 109 degrees in just 3o minutes. In an hour, that can reach over 130 degrees and after that will surpass 150. Even during cooler days, cars can absorb sunlight so rapidly and heat up internally. Once the body’s core temperature reaches 107 degrees or more, cellular and organ damage begins to occur. Sadly, 17% of these incidents are not accidental, as irresponsible parents leave their children in cars, thinking that there is no harm being done. Waze’s newest feature, in beta for now, is aimed at stopping the majority of these unfortunate circumstances with a simple pop up for distracted caretakers.
The option to enable the reminder will pop up after you use the app or you can head into settings and turn it on yourself. There are a few ways to customize the feature, like changing the message it displays. That is important because seeing the same message endlessly may cause people to grow accustomed to it and dismiss it over time. The other advantage is that this can be applied to other important reminders. Don’t have kids, but want to make sure you don’t leave your pet in the car? This can be modified to serve that purpose as well. The point is, use it. You may scoff at the thought of any parent somehow being able to forget their child in a vehicle but the world can and will sometimes catch you by surprise. Those families that lost loved ones in this exact manner also never thought there could be anything to make them forget about the precious life they had in the back seat of their car.
While in beta, Waze is asking for feedback on the feature’s usability, and will hopefully roll it out to all users soon.
[button link=”http://www.geektime.com/2016/07/26/afraid-of-forgetting-your-child-in-the-car-a-new-waze-feature-can-help/” icon=”fa-external-link” side=”left” target=”blank” color=”285b5e” textcolor=”ffffff”]Source: Geektime[/button]
