Mom Warns Parents of Shock Risk After Phone Charger ‘Throws’ Toddler Across Living Room

(Illustration - Shutterstock)

An Australian mother is alerting other parents to unseen dangers in the home after an often-neglected device injured her toddler; after playing with a phone charger, the woman’s baby daughter received an electrical shock so severe that it landed her in the emergency room.

The mother, who remains anonymous, shared her story with Facebook page CPR Kids in November 2019. “My daughter was admitted into the hospital Monday after receiving a pretty bad electrical shock from trying to plug my phone charger in,” she explained.

Illustration - Shutterstock | 2p2play

“Unfortunately, this happened right in front of me,” she went on; “I didn’t realize she knew how to attempt to plug in a charger until it was too late.” A disturbing photo accompanying the anecdote shows the toddler’s injured palm sporting a black burn mark near the thumb pad.

The phone charger was already plugged into a power strip. Then the toddler attempted to “plug” in the other end of the device, the connector intended for the phone itself, into the same outlet. Literal sparks flew.

The mother described seeing “sparks, and what looked like flames and black smoke” emanating from the socket. She claimed that the force of the shock “threw” her baby daughter several feet across the living room.

“She was quiet for a few seconds,” the mom recalled, “then started screaming and crying.” The worried mother rushed her daughter to her nearest hospital emergency room.

“In ER they found an entrance wound but not an exit,” she explained, “which worried them that it zapped her heart. She needed to stay overnight to monitor her heart. Thankfully, she is okay besides a burn on her hand.”

Illustration - Shutterstock | Troyan

It was an injury that this mother did not see coming despite having taken diligent safety measures around her home. Her family home, the mother explained, was baby-proofed with outlet covers, door stoppers, baby gates, and even stove-knob covers.

“[M]y baby,” she reflected, “still got hurt from something I stupidly never even considered would be an issue.”

As it turned out, this mother was not the only parent who was caught unaware of the hidden risk with phone cables; her Facebook post received many comments. “My son just started trying to do this,” said one mother. “So glad your bub is okay and thank you so much for the post!”

Photo courtesy of CPR Kids

“I didn’t think about this. Thanks for sharing,” added another. “I need to be extra careful now.”

“If you live in an older residence I would advise to have an electrician inspect your switch board,” one reader suggested, “and if necessary, fit residual current device RCD to all light and power circuits. Fuses and circuit breakers only protect wiring. RCDs save lives.”

Also responding to the cautionary tale, another mother, named Brooke Wade, posted a picture on Facebook of a nifty solution to clean up jumbles of errant wires, cables, and power strips: a sealed plastic tub modified for the job. “We keep our power board and chargers in a plastic container so our son can’t touch any of them,” Brooke explained. “Just a handy tip.”

According to a 2019 medical study published by StatPearls Publishing just weeks before this story went viral, there are at least 30,000 non-fatal “shock incidents”every single year in the United States. Approximately 5 percent of all burn unit admissions result from electrical injuries.

Around one-fifth of all reported electrical injuries occur in children, as per the study, and the incidence is highest among toddlers and adolescents.

CPR Kids, who shared the Australian mother’s warning to other parents, also shared an instructional video on YouTube. The video demonstrates vital first aid techniques for treating burns in children; to date, the video has reached tens of thousands of viewers.