Small children were rushed to emergency rooms an estimated 23,628 times because of shopping cart injuries in the U.S. in 2007 alone. Since so many plummet head-first to the floor, sidewalk or parking lot, two-thirds of those children had head injuries.
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Shopping carts sent more children age 5 and under to the hospital than cribs, high chairs, walkers /jumpers, baby gates and changing tables combined, according to the CPSC’s NEISS Clearinghouse Database that tracks hospital visits according to product type.
Despite the major attention and public alarm over lead paint in toys that resulted in the enactment of the Consumer Product Safety Improvement Act, there were not even enough hospital visits due to all types of toy-related poisoning in 2007 to estimate a number in the NEISS database. The visits were so low that for all toys combined, the results are “NA.” An examination of several high-profile CPSC recalls of toys for risk of lead poisoning showed no injuries or incidents were reported in those cases.
Yet a major law was passed to tighten regulations on makers of children’s products, a law that has been heavily criticized as potentially putting small independent toy makers out of business.
Meanwhile, about 65 small children in the U.S. alone were rushed to emergency rooms daily because of shopping cart-related injuries.
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