LOUISVILLE, Ky. — According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), in the United States, more children ages 1-4 die from drowning than any other cause of death except birth defects. 

“The worst thing we can see, all of these drownings, when someone drowns, that's a death that was preventable, that was a death that was preventable, and that, to me, is just the hardest thing,” Amy Albiero, owner of Cardinal Aquatics and SafeSplash SwimLabs said.

Also according to the CDC, every year in the United States, there are 3,960 fatal unintentional drownings, an average of 11 drowning deaths per day, and 8,080 non-fatal drownings, an average of 22 nonfatal drownings per day.

Due to COVID-19 and many businesses closing for several months, local swim schools are now seeing their numbers double. 

“We have more than doubled our enrollments, we have well over 800 enrollments in our books now. I think a lot of it was a backlog of children who weren't getting that experience last year, a couple of students who would've been taking lessons again this year,” George Villarreal, swim school manager at Bear Paddle Swim School said.

The Consumer Product Safety Commission's (CPSC) latest data shows, on average, 379 reported pool or spa-related drownings involve children younger than 15 years old each year.

Albiero said learning to swim is important at every age.

“Something that requires practice and just because you've maybe learned at one time doesn't necessarily guarantee that in a year from now, you're going to remember those things. Not just in pools but in lakes, in oceans, in places where you can't see the bottom, where you can't touch, those kinds of things can create a panic,” Albiero said.

According to CSPC, children younger than 5 years old accounted for 75% of child drownings between 2015 and 2017, more than half of which were attributed to a gap in adult supervision. 

For swim instructor Isaac Nelson, teaching children how to swim is his favorite part of the job.

“I would see kids barely touch the water and to just watch them get more and more comfortable to the point where they’re swimming all by themselves, facing the water and seeing them level up through the program it's just a very rewarding part of the job,” Nelson said.