NEWS-FINANCE -QUOTE-EDUCATIONAL AND MOTIVATIONAL
Australians’ swimming skills are at crisis levels, lifesaving organisations warn, as a new report shows 357 people drowned last financial year, the highest drowning death toll since records began in 1996.
The annual drowning report released by Royal Life Saving Australia and Surf Life Saving Australia on Tuesday recorded 357 deaths between 1 July 2024 and 30 June 2025 – 34 more than the previous year’s total of 323, and a 27% increase on the 10-year average.
One-third of those who drowned were over the age of 65, and drowning deaths among those aged 75 or older had increased by 63% on the 10-year average, the report shows.
Royal Life Saving Australia’s chief executive, Justin Scarr, said these increases were at least partly a consequence of the population ageing and not recognising or acknowledging how age and some health conditions or medications may affect their swimming skills.
“Older people, men particularly, overestimate their ability,” said Scarr. “They fail to recognise that their skills are in decline, and they can often be completely unaware that the medication that they’re taking can cause loss of consciousness or other symptoms that make it very difficult for them to swim in the light of safety.”
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The report expressed concern that Australians’ swimming skills may be at their lowest since the widespread adoption of school-based swimming programs in the 1970s.
Coastal drownings, accounting for 43% of the national total, remained a particular concern for Surf Life Saving Australia, said its chief executive, Adam Weir.
“Rip currents remain Australia’s number one coastal hazard, responsible for more than one in three beach drowning deaths – claiming more lives than sharks, floods or cyclones combined … More is being asked of surf lifesavers and lifeguards, as beach usage continues to grow and people explore a wider range of coastal locations.”
New South Wales had the highest number of drowning deaths at 129, followed by Queensland at 90. But the rate of drowning was highest in Western Australia, at 1.65 drownings per 100,000 people and 49 deaths; and lowest in Victoria, at 0.75 per 100,000 people or 52 deaths.
Of people whose country of birth was known (53%), 32% were born overseas.
Deaths of children under the age of five remained low against the 10-year average, which Scarr attributed to decades of work, including pool fencing legislation and awareness raising. Deaths of children aged five to 14 accounted for 3% of all drownings, but the deaths of 15-to24-year-olds was four times that, at 12%.
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“Parents sign up [their kids to swimming lessons] at six months of age and they hang in there for as long as they can. But the research shows that children are leaving lessons between the ages of six and seven, and they almost never return,” Scarr said.
The cost burden and patchy access to lessons and safe swimming places, among other factors, meant around half of children were leaving primary school unable to swim. If they left high school without those skills then they were at significant lifelong risk of drowning, Scarr said.
“Swimming education has fundamentally got to be wet. We can’t paste over that problem by replacing all swimming education with a brochure or an online program.”
Those in disadvantaged areas drowned at higher rates per population than in more advantaged areas, with children aged under 14 particularly vulnerable.
“We need kids in pools, and we need kids learning how to swim and swim long distances and life-saving strokes. And we’ve got to make it fun and enjoyable … to prepare older children for exposure to water well away from their parents, and likely in unpatrolled, unlifeguarded areas,” Scarr said.
