Lasko Products will pay $500,000 penalty for fialing to report defective fans

The U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC) announced on January 2, 2009 that Lasko Products Inc., of West Chester, Pa., has agreed to pay a $500,000 civil penalty. The penalty (see PDF file here), which has been provisionally accepted by the Commission, settles allegations that the company failed to immediately report incidents about its defective portable fans.

These box and floor fans were sold between 2000 and 2004. In February 2006, CPSC and Lasko announced the recall of about 5.6 million fans.

CPSC alleged that Lasko failed to report to the government in a timely manner that fans sold by the firm could overheat, smoke, or catch fire, and pose fire and burn hazards to consumers.

Between November 2002 and September 2005, Lasko received about 42 reports of fans overheating, smoking, melting, or catching fire, which resulted in nine personal injuries and property damage. Lasko did not fully report the incidents to CPSC until September 2005.

Consumers who have the recalled fans can still receive a free fan cord adaptor, designed to shut off the fan motor if overheating occurs. Contact Lasko at (800) 984-3311, or visit the firm’s Web site at www.laskoproducts.com/recall/recall_fans.html

Federal law requires firms to report to CPSC immediately (within 24 hours) after obtaining information reasonably supporting the conclusion that a product contains a defect which could create a substantial product hazard, creates an unreasonable risk of serious injury or death, or violates any consumer product safety rule, or any other rule, regulation, standard, or ban enforced by CPSC.

In agreeing to settle the matter, Lasko denies that it knowingly violated the law.

Consumer Product Safety Reform Act passes Senate

Strong support for this legislation:

The U.S. Senate on Thursday approved Sen. Mark Pryor's legislation that would make major changes to consumer product safety law. The Senate approved the bill, called the "Consumer Product Safety Reform Act," by a 79-13 vote after four days of debate.

"It provides new safety safeguards that emphasize resources, accountability, disclosure and testing _ from the factory floor to the store shelves," said Pryor, D-Ark.

The bill calls for a public database of consumer complaints, bolsters the Consumer Products Safety Commission to help it certify the safety of overseas products, bans lead in children's goods and sets new standards for safe toys. The Bush administration and other critics said the database unfairly could taint manufacturers. But President Bush has not threatened a veto.

The House's version has many differences, including a lower cap for jury awards.

Former heads of Consumer Product Safety Commission urge its strengthening

Ann Brown and Pamela Gilbert, the former chairman and executive director of the beleaguered Consumer Product Safety Commission, wrote an Op-Ed piece in Sunday's Washington Post that says what parents already know:

Parents across America are wondering if they can trust the toys on store shelves not to injure their children, or worse. They are asking who's in charge and what are they doing to keep dangerous toys from being sold....

What's the problem?

The commission has no chairman and has lacked a quorum for months. Without a quorum, it cannot bring a lawsuit, assess a penalty or enact new regulations to address hazards in the marketplace. Congress recently passed legislation to give it a quorum for six months, but after that, if no chairman has been approved, the commission will again be effectively unable to act.

What are they waiting for, since we now have weekly lead paint recalls?

Read the whole thing here.

China, U. S. work together on food safety

How's that apple?

From the Asia Times:

China and the United States have agreed on measures to improve the safety of Chinese exports of food and drugs after a wave of scandals involving tainted products.

The move could reduce tensions between the world's biggest consumer and exporter. Beijing has cited its own safety concerns in blocking imports of US food, but officials and commentators here have seen the action as retaliation for US rejection of Chinese goods....

Food scares and scandals have served to highlight problems in the US regulatory system. Last week, the FDA said it had suspended plans to close seven laboratories around the country after critics in Congress and advocacy groups said the closures would cripple a system already struggling to weed out unsafe products before they reach consumers. Further changes will await the recommendations of a high-level panel charged with finding ways to strengthen safeguards.

Read the rest here.

How big is the problem of lead in jewelry?

Inspections by the Consumer Product Safety Commission of 85 pieces of jewelry collected since last fall from retailers and importers determined that 20 percent still posed a potential poisoning hazard. Separate surveys by health officials or lead experts in Ohio, Massachusetts and Maryland found even higher percentages.

The unannounced federal inspections also left no doubt about the primary source of the threat: of the 17.9 million pieces of jewelry items pulled from the market since the start of 2005, 95 percent were made in China.

Numerous hazardous products imported from China — including toxic ingredients put into dog food, tainted toothpaste, faulty tires and toys coated in lead paint — have been recalled. But the problem with the children’s jewelry, persisting after two years, reveals just how difficult it may be to resolve such problems.

Federal officials said that they had made progress in curtailing the lead threat in children’s jewelry, but that they needed more enforcement powers, like the ability to impose fines or even criminal charges against repeat offenders. Scott Wolfson, a spokesman for the consumer safety commission, said, “We want to get to a point of not having to do recall after recall, and simply make the marketplace safe.”

Full story here in today's New York Times.

Is the Consumer Product Safety Commission overwhelmed?

From the Washington Post:

Mattel's announcement that it was recalling 1.5 million toys could force a reexamination of how the $22 billion toy industry is overseen by the Consumer Product Safety Commission, which largely relies on companies to report problems themselves, consumer groups, analysts and lawmakers said yesterday.

Like the 1.5 million Thomas and Friends trains and accessories recalled by RC2 Corp. in June, the Chinese-manufactured toys in this recall contained too much lead, Mattel said....

Safety problems with other Chinese products, such as seafood and tires, have raised questions about the U.S. government's ability to oversee imports.

"The Consumer Product Safety Commission does not have the resources to catch this type of problem," Mark Pryor (D-Ark.), chairman of the Senate Commerce Committee's consumer affairs subcommittee, said in an interview. "We're seeing this over and over. This is an agency that is withering on the vine."