Autumn Health and Safety Tips
Help ensure your autumn plans include ways to stay safe and healthy.
Keep your kids safe and healthy.
Get involved with your kids’ activities at home and at school to help ensure they are safe and healthy. Protect kids and young athletes against injury.
Autumn Games and Health Tips for Kids and Parents
Autumn Tips to Help Keep Your Kids Safe and Healthy
Concussion: Teaming Up to Protect Young Athletes
Healthy Schools, Healthy Youth
Keep Kids Safe on the Road- Every Trip, Every Time
Get a flu vaccination every autumn.
The single best way to protect against the flu is to get vaccinated each year. October through December is the best time to get vaccinated. Getting vaccinated later in the flu season still provides protection, as flu season normally peaks in January or later. Good health habits, like covering your cough and washing your hands, can also help prevent respiratory illnesses like the flu. Free or low-cost vaccinations may be available through your doctor or nurse, job, health department, clinic, grocery store, nursing home, or other location.
Flu Season is Here: How to Protect Yourself and Your Loved Ones
Use antibiotics wisely.
Get Smart about Antibiotics Week is in October. Antibiotics can cure bacterial infections, but not viral infections. The common cold and the flu are viral infections, so avoid using antibiotics if you have one of these. Using antibiotics when they are not needed causes some bacteria to become resistant to the antibiotic, and therefore stronger and harder to kill. See your doctor or nurse to find out if your illness is bacterial or viral.
Get Smart: Know When Antibiotics Work
Have a safe and healthy Halloween.
Make Halloween festivities fun, safe, and healthy for trick-or-treaters and party guests.
Halloween Health and Safety Tips
Halloween Scramble: Activity Sheet
for Kids
Test and replace batteries.
Check or replace carbon monoxide batteries twice a year when you change the time on your clocks each spring and fall. Also, for smoke alarms that use regular alkaline batteries, replace the batteries at least annually, perhaps when you change the time on your clocks for daylight savings. Test alarms monthly to ensure they work properly.
Fire Deaths and Injuries: Prevention Tips
Keep food safe.
Food is center stage during the holidays. Be sure to keep it safe by following basic food safety steps, including cleaning hands and surfaces often, separating foods to avoid cross-contamination, cooking to proper temperatures, and chilling promptly.
Thanksgiving: It’s Turkey Time
Learn your family history.
National Family History Day is observed on Thanksgiving Day. Over the holiday or at another family gathering, talk about and write down the health conditions that seem to run in your family. Learning about your family's health history may help ensure a longer, healthier future together.
Family History: Resources and Tools
My Family Health Portrait (HHS US Surgeon General)
Be prepared for cold weather.
Exposure to cold temperatures, whether indoors or outside, can cause serious or life-threatening health problems. Infants and the elderly are particularly at risk, but anyone can be affected. Know how to prevent cold weather-related health problems and what to do if a cold-weather health emergency arises. Remember that using space heaters and fireplaces can increase the risk of household fires and carbon monoxide poisoning.
Don’t drink and drive.
Alcohol use impairs skills needed to drive a car safely. It slows reaction time and impairs judgment and coordination. The more alcohol consumed, the greater the impairment. Alcohol-related motor vehicle crashes kill someone every 31 minutes and non-fatally injure someone every two minutes. Don’t drink and drive, and don’t let others drink and drive.
Alcohol: Frequently Asked Questions
Wash your hands.
Keeping hands clean is one of the most important steps we can take to avoid getting sick and spreading germs to others. It’s best to wash your hands with soap and clean running water for 20 seconds. If that’s not possible, use alcohol-based hand rubs.
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Page last modified: September 25, 2008
Page last reviewed: September 25, 2008