Costa Rica News – For anyone that has spent any time in Costa Rica, around any of the major holidays fireworks are a big part of the celebrations. The loud gunshot like noises will definitely rattle you a bit if you are not used to it.
Having been around some of these personally many of them are literally just gunpowder in some casing and are extremely dangerous to be around.
The Ministry of Health has a goal of ero children being burned by fireworks during the holiday season and into the new year.
In order to try to achieve this goal they have put together a team of over 200 inspectors to monitor the over 750 places that are authorized to sell fireworks in Costa Rica, most of which are in the San Jose area.
The only type of fireworks that can be sold to individuals are sparklers, flares, volcanoes, butterflies and similar types of fireworks.
Explosive powder fireworks are only allowed for companies organizing activities and shows.
The security forces and municipal police will ensure that no explosives are sold to minors.
In 2012 four children were reported being burnt with gunpowder from fireworks, and six children in 2013.
Now my opinion on this…….
Ok so in the past 2 years 10 children have been burned by fireworks, and the Costa Rican government has not decided to employ 200 inspectors that are going to maybe or maybe not have any effect on the fireworks burning children.
Have they done any research on if the fireworks that burned the children are those from these firework outlet?
What about teaching the dangers of fireworks in schools instead of trying to monitor the sources?
I do think that safety measures should be put in place but this does not really effect the underground firework market in Costa Rica.
I hope this works but as it is for many Costa Rican actions it seems more like they are not addressing the problem correctly.
