Noise and indoor climate

In many child care institutions it has now for several years been established that there are severe problems with noise and indoor climate. Looking back over the last 5-7 years it is quite plain that, with the rapidly growing number o*f municipal child care institutions, these examples have become more and more numerous. Inevitably, one cannot help feeling that this is a general problem. BUPL has for a long time been of the opinion that if more children are enrolled in the institutions noise and indoor climate conditions are certain to deteriorate, to the detriment of children and adults. Waiting lists for the child care institutions being the order of the day this is, unfortunately, not surprising. BUPL has, therefore, had to realise that weighty documentation of the problems is needed if in the future short-term economic considerations shall not take precedence over the long-term regard for the health of the children and the adults staying at the day care institutions. In the spring of 1997 BUPL's Executive Committee, consequently, resolved to launch a project that could provide the basis for BUPL's future effort to improve the noise and indoor climate conditions in the Danish child care institutions. This report includes the documentation of the situation in the child care institutions. We have chosen to attach great importance to finding out if regulations and guidelines governing noise and indoor climate are being observed in Danish child care institutions. We have also considered it relevant to listen to the employees' opinions and to have experts explain how noise and a poor indoor climate in child care institutions affect children and adults. Finally, we have analysed the possible causes of the fact that noise and indoor climate conditions in child care institutions have become a problem. Below we shall briefly summarise the investigations and project work of more than a year and a half, but by way of introduction we would like to point out the most important results: A comprehensive, representative and statistically reliable examination of the noise and indoor climate situation at 176 day care centres substantiates that regulations and guidelines governing noise and indoor climate are not observed in: 57 per cent of the Danish day nurseries 78 per cent of the Danish kindergartens 85 per cent of the Danish after-school day care centres Noise and indoor climate problems, then, rather than being exceptions represent the general practice. According to more than 80 per cent of a total of 391 child care teachers interviewed the noise and indoor climate conditions in the child care institutions are so poor that they cause problems. One third of the child care teachers state that they have been diagnosed by a doctor as suffering from one or more disorders that may be due to their working environment. Expert studies demonstrate that noise and a poor indoor climate may have very serious consequences for the health of children and adults, as well as for children's general and linguistic development.