by Alexia Vlachou
ATHENS, Sept.13 (Xinhua) -- High rates of drownings every year has led the Greek government to make compulsory the swimming lessons in public primary schools since the new academic year.
Despite Greece's thousands of kilometers of coastline, experts blame poor awareness and the lack of swimming culture for the alarming numbers of drowning deaths.
According to the latest official data from the Greek Coast Guard, 234 people lost their lives when swimming in Greek seas from May until August this year, in comparison to 146 drownings in the same period in 2015.
As schools opened on Monday, a main goal of the Greek Ministry of Education is to teach children of third and fourth grade basic water safety, survival and swimming skills to lower their risk of drowning and build vital skills for life.
"In Greece, we have a major issue as we don't know how to swim. It is very important to teach children from a very young age how to be safe when they swim," Fania Zaglakouti, a lifeguard from the Hellenic Lifeguard Academy ENAK, told Xinhua.
Children become very often victims of the sea if they are left unguarded in the beach, she explained.
"Their parents are not close to them, they leave them alone, so we ask them every time to supervise them very carefully," she stressed.
Zaglakouti explained to Xinhua that people, especially the elderly who are also among the most common victims of the sea, overestimate their powers and do not comply to the limits in the water set by lifeguards.
"They distance themselves from the shores and cannot return back," she said.
Another thing is that people dive after having eaten or drunk alcohol, which is forbidden.
Prevention and awareness of water safety rules is the key to avert fatal accidents in the sea, but the authorities need to step up efforts in a tourist country like Greece with 16,000 km of coastline, she said.
Local authorities are obliged to provide lifeguards to the beaches, according to specific regulations under their expenses.
"Each municipality bears the cost of the lifeguards and designates which beaches are popular in order to place each lifeguard in accordance with the coast guard," Dimitris Markou, mayor of Artemida municipality, a seaside resort in East Attica region, told Xinhua.
For Markou, who leads one of the exemplary municipalities in Greece regarding the safety measures taken, the legislation has gap in the shifts of the lifeguards.
According to regulations, each shift starts at 10:30 a.m. and finishes at 5:30 p.m.
"The shift should start at 8 o'clock in the morning, especially for the elderly people who come very early in the morning," he highlighted.
In line with Markou, Zaglakouti insists on changing the shift schedule in the legislation and extend it until the dawn of the sun during the swimming period which ends in September.
"People will feel safer if they know that there is someone out there to take care of them," she said.
