My son has vitiligo, and also burns quite easily on the spots where he has no pigmentation. At the beginning of every school year, his doctor supplies the correct paper work and I send a bottle of sunscreen to school.
We also apply sunscreen every morning, every day. It is a habit. Overcast or not. As a parent with a child who burns easily it is MY job to educate myself, overcast days do not protect from UV rays. I am pro-active, and I make sure my son will not burn.
When he goes to a friends, sunscreen is with him. It's not hard to do any of this, it just needs to be a priority and habit.
In my opinion, this mother should have asked the school's policy at the beginning of the year, or during registration, and then there would have never been a problem.
2nd Degree Sunburn When School Requires Doctor's Note for Sunscreen: Blame School?
Fef
2012/06/25 22:48:19
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Schools have to cover themselves from over-litigious parents. However, sometimes over-protecting students can lead to under-protecting them. Consider this case of a two girls Violet, 11, and Zoe, 9, in Tacoma, Washington. The girls suffer from a form of albinism and require sunscreen lotion when going in the sun. The school, however, requires a doctor's note for sunscreen. Who deserves the blame for the girls suffering 2nd degree sunburns.
FoxNews.com reports:
FoxNews.com reports:
A Tacoma, Wash., mom is seeing red after her fair-skinned daughters returned home from school severely sunburned. Michener says she did not give the girls sunscreen because it appeared to be an overcast day, but says that school officials should have been able to let them apply sunscreen when the sun came out--especially since both Violet, 11, and Zoe, 9, suffer from a form of albinism.
Read more: http://www.foxnews.com/health/2012/06/25/sisters-suffer-sever...
Read More: http://www.foxnews.com/health/2012/06/25/sisters-s...
Top Opinion
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Deliciously Melicious 2012/06/26 01:06:21
My daughter has asthma & she's not suppose to use her inhaler w/out a doctors note. I told her I don't care what anyone tells you, if you need your inhaler use it! What are they going to do, stop here midway? They'd have one hell of a fight on their hands if so.
Yeah, sue the school, that's the answer. And what do you think suing will accomplish? Will it take the sunburn away? Will making your already broke school district, more broke, and maybe getting a bit of money solve anything at all??
No. It wont. All it will do, is insure that more things like this happen.
The mother did not take the correct steps. Sending sunscreen without knowing the school's policy is lazy is at best.
Mom didn't bother to check school policy, or she would have taken care of it, long ago.
A responsible parent checks school policy... especially a parent with a child with health issues.
Stupid or not, it is the policy and she never bothered to check.
Now, why, when the mother should know that even on a cloudy day, sunburns are possible, particularly for sun-sensitive kids like hers, did she not slather her kids liberally before they even left, who knows? Also, why wait until the field day to find out? Her kids should have been using sunscreen all year, but she, the mother, is negligent, but wants to 'blame' someone, instead of taking responsibility for her own stupidity.
My own daughter had allergies. Periodically, she'd break out in hives, though we could not figure out the trigger for it. I had a doctor's note AND a bottle of benedryl at school for her, even though benedryl is OTC, and I also worked at the school, so presumably, she could have come to me. I wanted to make sure that just in case I wasn't there, and she broke out in hives, she didn't have to endure...
My own daughter had allergies. Periodically, she'd break out in hives, though we could not figure out the trigger for it. I had a doctor's note AND a bottle of benedryl at school for her, even though benedryl is OTC, and I also worked at the school, so presumably, she could have come to me. I wanted to make sure that just in case I wasn't there, and she broke out in hives, she didn't have to endure the discomfort.
Anytime your child has a condition which might even need a simple aspirin, you need to make sure you have everything in place before it is needed. Schools cannot give out meds, even OTC meds and sunscreen is classed as an OTC drug, without a doctor's note.
This mother was flat out negligent, but wanted to blame someone else for her stupidity. If she'd even called ahead of time, she would have understood the policy, based on state laws, which would not allow the school to either apply or allow her daughters to apply the sunscreen without a note. I imagine, too, that the daughters were given an option to go inside or stay out of the sun. They no doubt refused the offer.