New Federal Rule Promulgated after almost 3000 Children are Injured, and one Fatality
Since 2009, almost 3000 children required medical treatment after swallowing high powered magnets. One child died. The magnets are very small, the size of bb-gun pellets, and so high powered that it takes some force to pull two apart. When 2 or more are swallowed, they can cause serious injuries, including holes in the stomach and intestines and intestinal blockage.
“All of the children I represented needed surgery to remove the magnets and repair the damage to the stomach and intestines. Some of my clients needed more than one surgery. It took years to force a recall of some of these magnets and promulgate a new rule governing the manufacture and sale of these products.”
“I think as consumers we need to ask why thousands of children were injured before something was done to keep children safe from this hazard.”
Under the new rule’s performance standard, an individual magnet from a magnet set either must be large enough that the magnet does not fit into a “small parts cylinder” or the power of the magnetic force must be a flux index of 50 kG2 mm2 or less. Certain hazardous magnet sets that were previously in the marketplace had a magnetic force that was 37 times greater than what the new performance standard permits.
The new rule was promulgated by the Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC), the federal agency charged with regulating the consumer product industry.
“We are hoping the new magnets do not cause injuries. A certain amount of testing was part of this process, but my experience is that testing procedures can be flawed.”