Lifesaving society highlights newcomer swimming safety

The Lifesaving Society of Manitoba, along with the City of Winnipeg, is looking to teach newcomers some important water safety strategies in their own language.

On Monday, the Lifesaving Society of Manitoba kicked off the National Drowning Prevention Week, which looks to raise awareness promote drowning prevention strategies.

"Despite a downward trend, drowning is still the third leading cause of accidental death in Canada," Stacey Grocholski, executive director of the society, said at a news conference Monday.

"A common cause of drowning is falling into water and being unable to float or swim to safety. Knowing how to swim could save your life."

Part of this year's initiative includes a series of videos just released by the City of Winnipeg to teach newcomers about water safety. The videos present seven simple tips to newcomers in their first language to help them understand how to stay safe around lakes and rivers in the summertime.

The videos are presented in Arabic, English, French, Punjabi and Tagalog.

"I think about every summer there's at least one tragic case of a newcomer drowning," said Hafiz Jatto, the project lead. "For newcomers in particular, we're really trying to reverse this that trend."

Mounties say so far this year, there have been nine drownings in Manitoba, already eclipsing the six drownings that happened in 2022. RCMP does highlight that this data may include drownings that did not occur on waterways.

You can watch the water safety videos online.