The Consumer Product Safety Commission Is Out of Control

GURPS

INGSOC
PREMO Member
The agency that floated a gas-stove ban is also harassing the maker of a child-care product, while its ex-chair argues it should be able to regulate guns.


The CPSC is currently in the process of harassing a small-business owner whose product has been used safely by thousands of people since 2009. Leachco, an Oklahoma-based firm founded by Jamie and Clyde Leach, manufactures the Podster, a lounge pillow for infants. The pillow has sides that cup babies to keep them in place. Over 180,000 have been sold since the product first came to market.

In 2015, a day-care worker broke state law and the day-care center’s rules by leaving an infant unattended in a Podster for over an hour and a half. In 2018, two parents accidentally smothered their baby in bed while co-sleeping. Both those infants tragically died.

The CPSC is using those cases to warn consumers to “immediately stop using the Podster.” Both babies were in a Podster when they died, but anyone with common sense can see that the negligence of adults, not the safety of the product, was the likely culprit. Those are the only two infant deaths the CPSC cites as being associated with the Podster, which has otherwise been used safely by thousands of parents.

The CPSC’s administrative proceedings against Leachco acknowledge that in those two instances, adults were using the product improperly. It says, “The Podster is not and has never been advertised by [Leachco] as a sleep product” and that “the Podster contains warnings that the product should not be used for sleep and that adult supervision is always required.” Nonetheless, the CPSC says that “it is foreseeable that caregivers will use the Podster without supervision.”


If an agency can ban any product that, even with proper warnings, could possibly be misused by two people, then no product is safe.




 

LightRoasted

If I may ...
For your consideration ...

How come very sharp knives are sold without warnings? Really though. If peanut butter can have a label on it that says, "Allergy Warning: Contains peanuts", why don't knives have, "Warning: Knives can kill, maim, and cut"? Or does the obvious need warnings at all?
 

DaSDGuy

Well-Known Member
How many children have died or been injured while swimming, riding bicycles, or falling down while playing in a yard? Looks' like the CPSC members should all be charged with dereliction of duties because they didn't provide adequate warnings. Then send them to prison. Also, take away their pensions.
 

Hijinx

Well-Known Member
Just another agency with ten cents worth of authority and wants to run that into a Million dollars. This is the problem with regulation and not laws.

Regulations carry the weight of law, but are made up by one guy or a group of unelected morons who get off on making stupid regulations.
 
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