Key points:
1. Seven infant strangulation deaths are the latest reminder of government agencies’ failure to keep on top of product safety issues.
2. They are hamstrung by tiny budgets and producer-friendly regulations, but they could communicate what they know more effectively.
Seven babies and toddlers are dead.
They are the victims of strangulation from cords from video baby monitors sold by Summer Infant. The Rhode Island company sold the monitors nationwide since 2004, and last week issued a voluntary recall of 1.7 million products from store shelves.
The recall made national news, but you’d be forgiven for missing it with the round-the-clock coverage from Egypt, or drama at the Minnesota state capitol. Perhaps you culled it out from the dozens of similarly opaque recall notices at your local Babies-R-Us. Or Walmart, or Target. If you were extraordinarily savvy, you subscribed to the Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC) RSS feed.
Most likely, you didn’t hear about it. Nor do you hear about the weekly barrage of recalls and warnings from the CPSC, the FDA, and about a dozen other government agencies.
To get this out of the way: I believe the power of these agencies (and the requisite funding) to demand recalls of unsafe consumer products is unconscionable. Notice the juxtaposition between my first two statements in this article: On one hand, babies have been killed. On the other, a voluntary recall after over six years on the market. That the CPSC needs to wait for a company (in all but the most egregious of cases) to decide to recall is an unworkable situation.
That said, I can’t see an easy or clear fix. It would take an act of Congress, and I’m suspicious whether either chamber would take up potentially “anti-business” regulation at this point.
What I can get my head around is a better way to communicate.
What you need to realize first, especially in regard to consumer electronics, is how short a shelf life most products have. Let’s take a cell phone for an example: Unless there’s an apple on the back or you’re the owner of a popular Razr phone, it's likely the device you hold in your hand is the only production run they’ll do on that particular model. In other words, the company will make, say, 250,000 of a particular model and ship them worldwide. And unless the phone blows away sales projections, they’re on to the next thing. Our taste in consumer electronics is fickle—we won’t buy the same thing twice. Product life cycles are measured in weeks and months, not years.
As consumer electronics go, so does the rest of the market. If you’re lucky enough to find the same toy on the shelf six months after you see the first, it’s likely that toy has undergone at least one hardware or software revision.
From a safety regulator’s perspective, that makes the task of ensuring product safety daunting. By the time they get to a new product, it’s probably obsolete. The warning they might issue applies to a product that no longer exists. That’s one of the reasons the manufacturer doesn’t want them to do it. They’re always behind.
If it’s tough for a professional, it’s nearly impossible for the average consumer—much less the average parent.
Even when my wife and I were active consumers of infant products, the sheer number of notices and recalls was daunting. With as many as several per week, there was no way to keep up.
Add to that the short window of time parents have while their children move through development stages. What might have been critically important four weeks ago (i.e., supporting the head) is completely superseded by some new milestone—and with it, a new cadre of products.
Ugh.
It boils down to this: Recall information must be centralized, timely, and relevant.
First, centralized: Information from a dozen government agencies cannot mean checking a dozen Web sites. It’s too much—you’ll miss something. Second, timely: Information must move into the public’s hands faster. If Consumer Reports can figure this out on a shoestring budget, so can the CPSC and the FDA. Finally, and most importantly, relevance: I need to hear about only the products that matter to me—the one I purchased. Retailers, hear me when I say this: You collect and use tremendous analytics on our buying patterns. You know how to mine the data to get us to buy the next thing. That power must be used to let us know when something we bought—a toy, a phone, or a pound of hamburger—could kill us. We don't need to know the rest.
I am sick of the excuses. I am sick of the delays. It is time to get creative. It is time for public-private partnerships. But most of all, it is time to act—right now.
Related links:
FDA: MedWatch Safety Alerts for Human Medical Products
FDA: Recalls, Market Withdrawals, and Safety Alerts
CPSC RSS Feeds
CNN: 1.7 Million Baby Monitors Recalled After Two Infants Strangled by Cords












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