30+ kids…2-4 supervising adults/teenage councilors.
Yeah…this will happen.
The counselors should be trained in things like that, and there should be rules on what to do if a child is burned, and has been burned for X amount of time. The fact that nothing was done says to me that either the counselors were ignorant, or didn’t do their jobs. In this day and age, sun safety is something that is much more widely practiced, and I don’t think they should be given any slack. I wonder myself, if he’d gotten heat exhaustion if they counselors would have recognized it and known what to do at this rate. It’s not a good situation to just let be, keep at them until they put some safety rules in place Wallet.
Boy, did I learn this the hard way. One day, I’d been out in the sun for a while, and noticed that, oops, I was getting a tad pink, so I went inside to keep from getting really burned. I didn’t do anything to cool my skin, though, and a few hours later, I had glow-in-the-dark arms! Ouch!
Yah, that’s right. There’s a whole fucking group of 7 -8 year olds out there, and because the counselors were too concerned about keeping them from burning up, one kid dies and you would think the whole fucking world comes apart. JHC, don’t these underpaid overworked summer counselors really understand priorites?
Sunburns do indeed take time to develop. I’ll never forget the summer when my twin sister and I spent the day at the pool where my older sister was a lifeguard. I guess no one in my family had ever heard of sunscreen, because we did not have any. We played in that pool all day long, but it wasn’t until we got home that we realized we were burnt to a crispy crisp. It was a very painful experience. Black people aren’t supposed to get sunburns, dammit!*
For some reason, I’ve never had another sunburn, and it’s not because I avoid the sun. I dunno…maybe my skin back then was extra sensitive and I’ve built up tolerance?
*I’m sure that’s what my mother was thinking when it happened. But it’s so very untrue.
I was going to suggest a similar thing. Instead of wearing just swim trunks or a bikini down here (south FL, Keys) a lot of kids and adults wear full shirts and longer shorts that are specially made to block UV rays but are ultra light and easy to swim in.
Once, at a summer camp, we were doing some kind of gardening thing for a few hours just after noon, and I took my t-shirt off because I was getting too warm. (I was wearing a bathing suit underneath) I was old enough (11? 12?) to know that I damn well needed to put sunscreen on, but I’d only done my arms, legs, and face - not my back. And man… when that sunburn developed, it was AWFUL. I remember lying on my sleeping bag, pressing my back against it just so that it would flat-out HURT instead of burn/sting/itch beyond anything I’d previously thought possible. And more than anything else, I wanted my MOMMY. But there was a distinct lack of Mommy at summer camp. 
I blame that sunburn for most of the highly suspicious moles that I have on my back 10 years later.
For what it’s worth, if something like that were to happen to me now, I’d probably conscript my boyfriend to glop aloe onto my back every hour or so while keeping me supplied with Gatorade, painkillers, and Benadryl pills - to fend off itching and to knock me out. But it WON’T happen again, because I now sensibly hate and fear the evil day-star. hisssssss
Note the points Siege made. I think it’s important to have a word with whoever is in charge of this daycamp. If the counselors did what they were legally permitted to do, diligently, then it’s understandable. (And in this day and age, the idea of someone not related to him rubbing sunscreen over the body of a little boy could easily be translated to evil-touch pedophile in some people’s minds – they may have been mandated to encourage the kids to use their sunscreen but not touch them themselves.) If they were neglectful, time to get out a large can of whoop-ass and apply it liberally. But find out, don’t just assume it. And yes, make it very clear this was second-degree burns that Little Wallet is suffering with, not the “overprotective mother’s boy gets slightly burned” complaint that will be brushed off. In fact, an approach of “I’m not the sort of person who gets bent out of shape because of every little thing that happens to my kid, but this one is serious enough to justify bringing it to your attention strongly” may be the best move.
If you’ve got fresh aloe, peel off the skin and put the entire lump of aloe on the burns - cover it with cotton bandage, the aloe will suck out the heat and shrivel away as it does it’s job. I burnt my hand playing superwoman with the radiator cap (don’t ask) and I put huge pieces of aloe into my hand and outside it and covered it with a clean sock. I shudder to think what it would have been like if I had not.
You’re not a bad parent at all - you covered him and he was supposed to be in good hands. Do let the camp know, we don’t want a repeat of this to happen.
No thanks, I’d rather pit the moronic camp counselors who were somehow unaware that the kids would need sunscreen. Seriously, how can you possibly be that dumb?
Poor kid. My sympathies. I’ve never had a sunburn that bad; my parents were strict about sunscreen. It’s gotta suck to have this happen just because you let the kid go to the beach with these apparently wholly incompetent camp counselors. (I wonder if the other kids got burned too . . . you should make sure the camp knows about their oversight.)
Um, what? 
Are you under the impression that you can do something to fix it post-exposure?
If that’s the case, it’s sad. Easy solution, though: have them apply their own sunscreen and assign them to pairs to put it on each other’s hard-to-reach places.
Okay, (A) there’s no “heat” to suck out. Sunburn is caused by damage to the skin from UV radiation. (B) Seriously, “suck out the heat”? (C) Peeling skin off is probably not a great idea. It’ll slough off on its own eventually, but you don’t want to hurry the process as it’ll leave you open to infection. (D) Sunburn is unrelated to burns from heat, as (once again) it’s not caused by heat, but by UV radiation. Your comparison to an actual burn you experienced is a bad one.
Okay, I pit you for thinking that camp counselors would keep an eye out for sunburning. That they might, perhaps, check to see if the kids are burning and take remedies for such action. Or that their bosses might live up to their fiduciary responsibility of ensuring such precautions were taken. Come to think of it, that doesn’t seem so pit worthy, does it. I guess you’re not the worst mother ever. 
THE HAMSTERS ATE MY REPLY! Bastards.
Excalibre - I worked at an elementary school where we had a summer water fun day at the end of June. We had a strict “hands off” policy for all the staff, and our new principal was insane about it. So we told the kids they had to help each other out.
We ended up with 5 parent complaints about children touching other children in ways that might have made their precious feel “uncomfortable”. Now - we were supervising, and honestly, in NO WAY was anything “inappropriate”. For Og’s sake! We just can’t win.
Wallet - I feel bad for your little guy. I was dumb last August and got this NASTY sunburn at a dog show. It was so bad, I wanted to rip my skin off. The only thing that made it better was standing in a super HOT shower, because nothing else would take the burning and the itching away. OH GOD, I wanted someone to shoot me, right then and there. Some spots even peeled, then blistered again! GARGH. It was horrid. Horrid horrid horrid.
Poor little guy. I can so feel his pain. wince
That’s so goddamn stupid it makes me want to vomit out my internal organs.
That’s what comes of our modern obsession with finding pedophilia everywhere. What the fuck can be done? Have all the parents sign something saying, “I hereby affirm that I’m not going to lodge lunatic complaints about imaginary child abuse”? “I have an intelligence greater than the average potted plant, and thus recognize the importance of applying sunscreen and hereby grant permission for you to do so”?
Wow, that was kind of unnecessarily brusque. I’m pretty sure she meant peel the “skin” off the aloe and put the aloe on the burn, which is what many many other posters here are advising, regardless of whether the burn is caused by heat or by UV radiation.
Oh, okay, I think you’re right about that.
The rest of what I said still applies, though. I’m rather amazed that there are still people who don’t actually understand what causes a sunburn.
I’m not at all defending the counselors by saying this; rather the reverse, because it’s something they should be alert to – but sunburns have changed significantly in the last 30-40 years. Or at least, the damage the sun does has increased. I know a lot of adults who don’t take much precaution against the sun because it wasn’t so bad when they were growing up. But it is measurably more damaging now.
Sailboat
This happened to my children at their summer camp last year and you bet I spoke to the administration. They’re being paid to make sure my children are safe. If the children were old enough to know when they needed sunscreen or myriad other things, they could stay at home unsupervised. They aren’t, so they don’t.
A suggestion regarding the aloe vera – keep applying it. I’m not sure about sunburns with blisters, but with every burn I’ve had and my children have had, I just keep slathering it on, repeatedly. When it dries, put some more on. I found this promotes healing. One or two applications don’t do much.
By the way, I’ve recently managed to find sunblock in spray-on form - see here. I’m not sure whether it actually protects as well as the usual goop-on stuff, but it’s very useful for parts in hair, and I bet it’d help teachers or counselors who need to put sunscreen on kids’ [del]special areas[/del] backs.
Coming from the land of melanomas and depleted ozone, I second those who have already noted clothing being the only real way of stopping sunburn but not fun. Children these days wear what looks like a wet suit but is breathable and very light - older kids have stuff too, but many think it is uncool and getting them to wear it can be a problem. I always wear a t-shirt if I go swimming, sometimes shorts as well.
I’ve had some luck by cooling my skin after coming in–doesn’t prevent a burn, but lessens the degree somewhat. Kinda like putting boiled eggs in cold water to stop the cooking process.