{"id":6586,"date":"2026-07-20T12:36:02","date_gmt":"2026-07-20T12:36:02","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/relocationtimess.com\/?p=6586"},"modified":"2026-07-20T12:36:02","modified_gmt":"2026-07-20T12:36:02","slug":"the-rise-of-safety-fatigue-among-parents","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/relocationtimess.com\/?p=6586","title":{"rendered":"The rise of \u2018safety fatigue\u2019 among parents"},"content":{"rendered":"
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\n Dr. Edith Bracho-Sanchez is a primary care pediatrician at Columbia University Irving Medical Center in New York City. She hosts the Healthy Children podcast from the American Academy of Pediatrics.\n<\/p>

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\n I just learned from a firefighter on Instagram that leaving my child\u2019s bedroom door open at night makes it much more likely he would die in the event of a fire. Closing it, on the other hand, would keep the flames outside his room and ensure his survival, he assured me.\n <\/p>\n

\n Yet another new fear I unlocked while scrolling social media.\n <\/p>\n

\n What did I do with this newfound wisdom,you may ask? Nothing, apparently. My 4-year-old can\u2019t sleep if we close his door, and my 5-month-old still sleeps in our room. I glanced at the smoke detectors and saw the lights signaling they were working, and I called it a night.\n <\/p>\n

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\nmother sitting on landing floor whilst her baby plays in the background<\/span>\n<\/div>\n
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\nParents are feeling lonely. Here\u2019s why it matters<\/span>\n<\/p>\n

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\n The thing about my social media feed, though \u2014 and I suspect I\u2019m not alone \u2014 is that videos such as the firefighter\u2019s are presented side by side with videos on things like drowning prevention. On some level, most can tell the difference between what applies to us and is a reasonable measure for our kids\u2019 safety and what is not. But the more scary videos I see on my feed lately, the faster I scroll past. I am so tired I cannot do one more thing.\n <\/p>\n

\n I am embarrassed to admit my exhaustion at looking after my kids\u2019 safety. I\u2019m not just a mother of two; I\u2019m a pediatrician. Vigilance is supposed to be my job. For what it\u2019s worth, I take solace in what I\u2019m hearing in my practice these days \u2014 versions of my own scroll-and-flinch from parents who are otherwise thoughtful, engaged and doing everything right.\n <\/p>\n

\n These parents are not careless. They\u2019re exhausted. I believe there\u2019s a term for what\u2019s happening to us, even if it isn\u2019t official medical language yet: \u201csafety fatigue.\u201d To me, this is what happens when the volume of warnings \u2014 real and exaggerated, urgent and negligible \u2014 gets so loud that we lose the ability to tell them apart. We start tuning all the warnings out, including the ones that matter.\n <\/p>\n

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\nDr. Edith Bracho-Sanchez, a mother of two and pediatrician, finds the loudest voices in parents’ social media feeds are rarely the most qualified ones.<\/span>\n<\/div>\n
Courtesy Edith Bracho-Sanchez<\/figcaption>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

\n How to tell risk from fear\n<\/h2>\n

\n The firefighter wasn\u2019t lying. \u201cClose before you doze\u201d is a real campaign built on real research. Fire scientists at UL Research Institutes\u2019 Fire Safety Research Institute found that a closed door can keep a room dozens of degrees cooler and far less toxic during a house fire than one left open. That\u2019s true. It\u2019s also true that it\u2019s rare to have a fire reach a child\u2019s bedroom while they\u2019re asleep in it.\n <\/p>\n

\n That\u2019s the trap. A piece of safety advice can be completely accurate and still not be the thing you need to worry about the most tonight. Psychologists call this the availability heuristic: We think of danger, or the probability of an event, not by how likely it is, but by how easily we can recall an example of it.\n <\/p>\n

\n A dramatic video, such as one with side-by-side images of bedrooms of kids who made it in a fire and those who didn\u2019t, is something we remember. A statistic is often not. So, the rare house fire crowds out our attention for something far more mundane and far more likely to hurt our kids, like a car ride without a properly installed car seat, or a pool without a fence.\n <\/p>\n

\n When I\u2019m trying to sort a real risk from a frightening one, I ask two questions: How often does this actually happen to children? How much does the fix cost me in time, money or peace of mind? Rare events with quick fixes I don\u2019t have to think about constantly \u2014 a smoke detector, a safe gun-storage box \u2014 are worth doing even if the odds are long. Rare events that demand constant vigilance to prevent, such as the door-closing ritual, are the ones I\u2019ve learned to let go of without guilt.\n <\/p>\n

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\n Who to trust amid the noise\n<\/h2>\n

\n Part of what makes digesting all the advice so hard is that the loudest voice in a parent\u2019s feed is rarely the most qualified one. Researchers who studied top-performing TikTok content in the \u201cnatural parenting\u201d and wellness space last year found that most of the health claims in those videos were misleading, and that 80% of that misinformation was coming from other parents and influencers (not medical professionals). It doesn\u2019t mean every parent-creator is wrong or every doctor is right. It means the algorithm is optimized for engagement, not accuracy, and fear is extremely engaging.\n <\/p>\n

\n I tell the parents in my practice to do what I do with my own feed: Check who\u2019s talking, not just what they\u2019re saying. Is this a claim from a pediatrician, a fire scientist or a toxicologist \u2014 someone with expertise and something to lose if they\u2019re wrong? Is there a citation, or just a warning and a soundtrack?\n <\/p>\n

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\nAutomatic pistol gun on glass table in bedroom in luxury hotel in silhouette with reflection of window light.<\/span>\n<\/div>\n
edwardolive\/iStockphoto\/Getty Images<\/figcaption>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
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\n Sites such as HealthyChildren.org from the American Academy of Pediatrics and your own child\u2019s doctor may seem unglamorous compared with a viral video, but they\u2019re built to be boring and correct rather than exciting and unverified. To me, that\u2019s a trade worth making.\n <\/p>\n

\n What keeps pediatricians up at night\n<\/h2>\n

\n Here\u2019s what parents often bring up in my exam room unprompted: rare infections, weird allergies and the multi-symptom syndromes that dominate parenting group chats. Here\u2019s what doesn\u2019t come up but should:\n <\/p>\n

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