The staff of U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission is recommending that commission take action to protect children from being strangulated by cords on window coverings.
On Wednesday, the staff urged the commission to approve a petition filed by consumer and safety groups in May 2013.
In 2014, seven deaths were caused by strangulation from window covering cords. Between 1996 and 2012, 285 deaths occurred and 1,590 children received treatment for injuries resulting from entanglements on window covering cords.
Children still dying
“There are no words to describe what it is like to find your beloved child dangling, lifeless, with a window blind cord wrapped around their neck,” said Erica and Stephen Thomas, parents of two-year-old Cormac Thomas who died in March due to asphyxiation from a window covering cord. “We have the opportunity to prevent this tragedy from striking any other family: CPSC must move forward with this petition.”
“We applaud the CPSC staff for recommending that CPSC take action to protect children from the hazards posed by accessible cords on window coverings,” said Linda Kaiser, founder and president of Parents for Window Blind Safety. “Children are dying on products that comply with the current safety standard. It is critical that CPSC finalize a strong mandatory standard as soon as possible.”
Linda Kaiser and her husband Matt formed Parents for Window Blind Safety in 2002, after their daughter, Cheyenne Rose, died as a result of being strangled by a window blind cord.
Consumer groups ask for mandatory standard
Due to the continuing death rate, the failure of the voluntary standards to address the hazard, and the availability of products and technology that can prevent this hazard, the Consumer Federation of America, Parents for Window Blind Safety, Kids In Danger, Consumers Union, Independent Safety Consulting, U.S. PIRG, Public Citizen, and other organizations filed a petition with commission in 2013, asking that the agency adopt a mandatory standard that prohibits hazardous operating cords on window coverings.
The petition said the industry hasn’t stopped this hazard despite knowing since 1983 that infants and young children were strangling on window covering cords at a rate of one or more per month. It also said that the voluntary standards process, starting from the first standard in 1996 and including the most recent standard in 2012, has failed to eliminate or reduce the risk to young children of strangulation and asphyxiation by window covering cords.
“A strong mandatory standard by the CPSC is necessary to protect children,” said Rachel Weintraub, legislative director for the Consumer Federation of America. “For almost 20 years, the voluntary standard has failed to address the strangulation posed to children and children have been killed and seriously injured as a result.”
Window coverings that eliminate accessible, hazardous cords are available, add minimum costs to the manufacturing of blinds, and can be used on the vast majority of blinds and shades, the consumer groups said.
In addition, they said designs that make the pull cords inaccessible have been available since the 1990s but were never sold because the commission allowed separated cord tassels to serve as a compliant design.
