It’s complicated being a consumer these days. There’s so much information, but most of it is to get you to buy stuff rather than make financial choices that are good for you.
In recognition of National Consumer Protection Week 2026, March 1-7, the U.S. PIRG Education Fund is showcasing resources to help Americans address a wide range of common issues. U.S. PIRG is a public interest research group.
“Taking care of all of your personal business can seem like a part-time job sometimes,” Teresa Murray, consumer watchdog director for U.S. PIRG Education Fund, said in a statement. “We aim to help consumers help themselves with easy-to-understand guides focused on some of the problems that plague us most.”
Unsafe products
In August 2012, a family reported that their 2-year-old son was admitted to the hospital after nearly drowning in a 48-inch-tall pool.
“On these Intex pools,” a parent wrote in a complaint, “there is a band that runs about a foot off of the ground and our child used that as a step and climbed over the top.” This parent’s warning to the Consumer Product Safety Commission, or CPSC, came five years after the first child drowning in an Intex pool in 2007. There were three more deaths in 2011.
It wasn’t until July 2025, after nine children had drowned in pools designed like this, that Intex and two other companies recalled about 5 million pools and offered a free repair kit to eliminate the danger.
Way too often, recalls don’t happen until years after initial reports of deaths and major injuries, according to U.S. PIRG Education Fund’s new report, “Safe At Home in 2026?”
For example, in 2019, a 41-year-old woman said when she was making beef stew in a SharkNinja Foodi pressure cooker, it exploded and caused second-degree burns on her abdomen. It took more than five years, after 105 similar complaints and 26 lawsuits, for SharkNinja in May 2025 to recall more than 2 million of the pressure cookers and offer owners free replacement lids.
These two cases were among 420 recall announcements in 2025 – a year marked by the highest number of injuries linked to recalled hazardous products since 2016, according to U.S PIRG Education Fund’s analysis of recall announcements by the CPSC.
Regulators tallied 882 injuries from products recalled in 2025. Not all of these injuries occurred in 2025; some occurred months or years earlier.
“This time lag is very much the point,” Murray said. “It’s horrific to see that it sometimes takes months or even years to recall a hazardous product.”
Other key findings from the report:
- The CPSC’s 420 recall announcements in 2025 covered more than 40 million items. That’s a big jump from the 305 announcements in 2024 and the largest annual total since 2007.
- More than one-fourth of the recalls involved children’s products: toys, infant sleep products, clothing, and other items for children.
- Besides the pools and pressure cookers, some of the other biggest recalls of the year involved dumbbells, burst-proof hoses, attic fan motors, countertop ovens, and power banks.
The U.S. PIRG Education Fund also looked at online shopping. While many shoppers enjoy the convenience and wide selection available from online retailers, these companies comply less often than “brick and mortar” stores with U.S. safety standards. And if online sellers’ products turn out to be hazardous, it’s often more difficult for regulators to demand accountability and for customers to get refunds, repairs, or replacements – especially if the seller is in another country.
“Given how long some products can stay on sale, even after they may have hurt or killed someone, it’s important to recognize the warning signs of a hazardous product before it enters your home,” saidAndre Delattre, the Public Interest Network’s senior vice president and COO. “The best way to avoid an injury or fire from an unsafe product is to never buy it.”
The U.S. PIRG Education Fund is highlighting its guides and reports during National Consumer Protection Week 2026. Among the group’s guides and articles on product safety are:
Tips to Shop Smarter and Safer and Avoid Hazardous Products
