The dad of a schoolboy from Greater Manchester who was permanently disfigured after being badly burned by a disposable barbecue is calling for them to be banned.
Toby Tyler's son Will needed skin grafts and has been and has been left with lifelong scars after stepping on an extremely hot piece of sand where a barbecue had been in June 2020. The family had moved the barbecue hours earlier but the sand was still "red hot" when Will walked over it.
Mr Tyler, a schoolteacher from Stockport, had to carry his then nine-year-old son for 20 minutes to get him from Formby beach on Merseyside to the family car. From there he rushed Will to hospital with wife Claire, 44, and daughter Lily, 13.
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He suffered burns so severe that the youngster, who is now 11, had to have skin grafts from his right thigh to his left foot at the Royal Manchester Children’s Hospital.
The Year Six pupil still has to go back to hospital every six to eight weeks for checks. A process which will continue until he stops growing.
Speaking out just days after seven-year-old girl Simi Adenaike was badly burned in a similar incident in Swansea, Mr Tyler, 52, says disposable barbecues now need to be banned before more people come to harm.
He said the trauma of his son's injury had had a "significant impact” on him both physically and psychologically. This includes PTSD, and "severe anxiety attacks”.
"He has to wear the compression sock all the time, including at school and in swimming and PE", he said "He has massages twice a day, a splint as well as frequent and regular visits to the hospital’s burns unit and psychosocial support unit.
“Has to wear special UV shoes - he's very vulnerable to sunlight so doesn’t get that feeling anymore to walk in the sand. Otherwise - he suffered from quite bad anxiety attacks and there was a strong feeling of PTSD affecting him.
"I think it's evolving now and he has been diagnosed with autism since the trauma. I think it has probably always been an issue for Will but the accident has opened or exaggerated pathways.”
Mr Tyler has since launched a petition calling for a ban. He believes there are “far too many risks and dangers” associated with disposable barbecues.
He is also backing National BBQ Week’s “Ditch the Disposable” campaign- which is calling for the government to introduce legislation that would outlaw the items - more than a million of which end up in landfill every year.
“They are awful things and don’t even cook food very well," Mr Tyler said."There are so many reasons not to use them and there are so many better far better alternatives.”
National BBQ Week's founder Brian George, aka the Grillmaster, said: “We have been calling for retailers to Ditch the Disposable since 2020 and this is a prime example of the dire need for a nationwide ban. They may be cheap to buy but they have a heavy environmental price.
"Whilst some national retailers have already put partial bans in place, it’s simply not enough, retailers need to enforce a complete ban or else the UK government needs to step in and enforce a ban.
"In the meantime, I would encourage shoppers to send them a clear message not to buy them and that they have no place on shop shelves in 2022. As we’ve said many, many times, Ditch the Disposable.”
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