Ten-year-old hailed as Hero for saving toddler from drowning

• By Tracy Tafirenyika

A quick-thinking ten-year-old is being praised for taking action that helped save his toddler cousin from drowning.

On the day of the incident, Taylen Harris, a grade 5 student at the Windhoek International School, returned home from soccer practice to which he joined a group of friends and family who were playing in a pool but he quickly realised his three-year-old cousin, had taken off her life jacket and was laying still underwater.

According to Harris, he noticed his cousin was not moving which prompted him to dive deep into the pool to rescue her, grabing her by the arm and pulling her to the surface, where a CardioPulmonary Resuscitation (CPR) was conducted which helped his cousin’s life.

“I was in the pool racing with my friend then I noticed something was wrong with my cousin. When I first saw her, I freaked out because I did not know what was happening but I quickly realised she had taken off her life jacket and was not moving.

I dove into the pool as fast as I could, dragged her out and was taken to hospital after receiving CPR.

“I felt relived and thankful because God can always perform miracles. God took me to perform the miracle by saving my cousin. I learned that God uses small children to perform miracles,” he said.

More than 2,5 million people world-wide have drowned over the past decade, and the World Health Organisation (WHO) reports that drowning is one of the top 10 causes of death for people under 25 in every region of the world.

Namibia has so far witnessed more than 50 drowning related deaths.