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product_liability defective_baby_productsThe U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC) Chairman Hal Stratton told the House Commerce Subcommittee on Consumer Protection in October 2004 that the commission continues to enforce standards, announce recalls and prevent deaths and injuries from occurring. The Consumers Union, the organization that publishes Consumer Reports, had announced its investigators had no problem buying dozens of products violating American safety standards at U.S. stores, attributing it in part to relaxed enforcement by the CPSC. Stratton argued the number of baby recalls is up in the most recent fiscal year, increasing from 2003 to 2004 from 279 to 356.
As a result of baby recalls, despite the increase in the number of toys and children products on the market, Stratton says deaths and injuries has not risen in recent years. Using crib safety as an example of CPSC protection, after developing mandatory and voluntary standards for covering side height, slat spacing, mattress fit, hazardous cut outs and corners posts, the commission says infant crib deaths have significantly declined.
Still, every year baby recalls involve potentially deadly defects and consumers are often surprised at learning the number of recalls that are announced for consumer products every year. Though the CPSC is in charge of protecting consumer safety for over 15,000 different types of consumer products, babies especially have an increased vulnerability to injuries, both fatal and nonfatal. When the American Academy of Pediatrics recommended banning the manufacture and sale of mobile infant walkers, the baby recalls were never issued. More than half of all babies between five and 15 months use walkers, despite more than 14,000 babies being sent to the hospital emergency room in 1997.
Initially, the CPSC only addressed injuries to babies'' hands from pinching and did nothing to address the issues of falls, with the majority of severe injuries having occurred when the walker goes down the stairs. About a quarter of all reported injuries with walkers involved head injuries, including fractures, yet baby recalls for walkers were never made. Instead, walkers must meet a standard, adopted in July 1997 of having one of two features. The CPSC announced an 84 percent reduction in injuries of children in baby walkers has occurred between 2001 to 2003, but there were still many years babies continued to suffer serious injuries because of them.
Even though baby recalls may have increased and the CPSC argues crib-related injuries and baby walker injuries have declined, there are still a high number of products that have designs that will not prevent all injuries. A federal court ruled November 1, 2004 unanimously that companies failing to abide by government reporting rules could be held liable for civil penalties. The case ruling was unprecedented since no court has ever addressed CPSC''s reporting requirements, Stratton said. The federal court backed product reporting rules will hopefully allow quicker and more efficient baby recalls to be announced when necessary so that potential injury and death risks are reduced.
The ruling by the U.S. Court of Appeal for the Ninth Circuit in San Diego held a company commits a separate offense for every potentially dangerous unit it fails to report. Even though the ruling was a positive step in protecting the safety of American consumers, parents should still exercise caution when purchasing or being given baby products, especially secondhand, since baby recalls cannot always eliminate all affected models from households and secondhand shops.
Evenflo has recalled about one million defective child car seats after government testing showed they could fail to protect children during side-impact collisions.
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