Republicans aim to cut financing for toy hazard database
In 2008, Congress passed the Consumer Product Safety Improvement Act after a flood of unsafe toys from China hit the U.S. market. Less than three years later, however, the new Republican-led House of Representatives wants to roll back those protections by cutting $3 million in financing for a database where consumers could report product hazards and the public could check products before buying them.
It also wants to scale back back the requirement for third-party testing for lead and other hazards in products sold to children, while some GOP representatives have even proposed limiting the new protections to products for children under 6 or 7, rather than up to 12 years of age.
As part of this latest campaign against government regulation, some businesses warn that (a) the hazard database would open the door to bogus charges and lawsuits; (b) third-party testing of children’s products is too costly; and (c) some products should not be tested at all for things like lead because children are unlikely to eat them.
The New York Times, which is highly critical of the new campaign, calls the concern over frivolous lawsuits “a predictable canard,” noting that the database was designed with safeguards to avoid bogus claims. In an editorial, the paper noted that the small increase in costs due to testing is more than offset by the damage incurred by families and society when a child is poisoned or hurt by a dangerous toy, and that exposing older children to similar risks is unacceptable.
It also points out that there is still a lot of lead out there. Since the new law was passed in 2008, the Consumer Product Safety Commission has issued 26 lead-related toy recalls.
Source: The New York Times
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