Fall highlights safety at home

Waikato is one of the worst performing regions when it comes to home-based accidents, with 53 people killed and 71,000 injured in the last year.

The figures, which racked up more than $71 million in ACC costs, were revealed this week by ACC and place the Waikato region third in the country for home injuries per capita over the past 12 months.

Home accidents deaths total more than the number of people killed on the road and in the workplace combined, with the majority of home-based deaths caused by slips, trips and falls.

In Hamilton 18 people died in homes accidents and 26,264 were injured.

One of those injured was Hamilton woman Chris Tavai who lost her footing and injured her ankle walking down the steps leading to her garage

"There's only three steps," Ms Tavai said.

"I don't remember what happened, I woke up and the kids were like `mummy are you OK'."

Ironically, Ms Tavai is an ACC safety wellbeing co-ordinator who said her life was "wrecked for a good six months" following her accident that left her in a moonboot.

Safety New Zealand Week, which runs this week, encourages people to find out how they can make their homes safer.

Despite her working role which focuses on safety, Mrs Tavai said she was only human like everyone else.

She said people took for granted all those little things in their home which could so easily cause problems.

She said safety week was a good way to reinforce dangers in the home and raise public awareness of them.

The most dangerous regions, based on ACC claims, were Northland and Hawke's Bay where one in five people suffered an injury at home, while Waikato and Taranaki followed.

The safest regions were Southland and Marlborough.

Hana Garrett-Walker is a Massey University journalism student.

- © Fairfax NZ News