Fisher Price Recall

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http://www.cbc.ca/consumer/story/2010/0 ... ml?ref=rss

Many Fisher Price highchairs and tricycles and more are under recall.

I heard about that on the news on the way home from work, today.

Oh dear, does this mean I should boycott their stuff for the safety of my child?

I hardly even pay attention to these recalls anymore. More than half of my kids' stuff has been recalled over the last 5 years or so. The crib we had was recalled twice and the replacement parts they sent us were way cheaper and so poorly made that we just switched her to a toddler bed instead. I did throw out the lead paint baby toys as soon as we found out about those, but a lot of these recalls are the result of parenting malfunctions moreso than product malfunctions. Such as "if your child climbs up on the back side of the highchair and sticks his head in the...," you get the idea. Companies act to save their butts from lawsuits. According to Hot Wheels, I shouldn't let my 2.5 yo touch one of their toy cars (3+). A good dose of common sense is the key. Watch your kids and they'll be fine. That's not to say I'm not completely frusterated by all the nonsense. The food and drug recalls concern me much more than the toy recalls.

Most children's stores post recall lists very prominently, with pictures and all. Since I practically lived in the stores when the kids were little, it was easy to stay up on the newest recalls.

You generally don't have to be concerned about new purchases as much as about used purchases and hand-me-downs. Many of those may have been recalled and that information won't be given to you. Even then, not all recalls are created equally, and some may not really be of concern to you ("item may fail when driven in a pumpkin patch" is irrelevant if you would never use it in a pumpkin patch, for example).

Figure out the common sense rules and check the items you are thinking of buying using those. Hazards include suffocation, strangulation, and chocking on small parts. A check of the item should allow you to get a sense of if any of these might apply, and then to see what they did in manufacturing as an attempt to deal with the issue. More tricky are the chemical composition issues, because infants and toddlers put everything in their mouths, so every item needs to be free of toxins. That, unfortunately, isn't usually well disclosed, and you may have to create your own "reduce the risk" standards (one you won't hear about is flame retardant, which is on most everything, and considered safe, as if no one considered infants will chew they PJ's).