Personal Injury Blog

CPSC New Federal Infant Bath Seats Standards

August 24th, 2011
Infant bath seat standards

Infant Bath Seats did not have established federal regulations.

Currently, there are no established federal infant bath seats standards that are mandatory for all manufacturers. Instead, manufacturers are required to follow voluntary ATSM requirements for infant bath seat safety. This is in spite of the fact that between 1980 and 2009, the Consumer Product Safety Commission recorded 174 deaths of children in bath seat-related accidents.

That’ll soon change. The Consumer Product Safety Commission has approved new federal safety standards for infant bath seats. It’s the first time the agency has required such mandatory standards for infant bath seats, and it gives new hope to California Injury Lawyers that these will help prevent the kind of serious bath seat accidents that occur every year.

Under the new requirements, manufacturers must adopt enhanced standards while manufacturing bath seats. Included in these requirements are enhanced stability standards to prevent the bath seat from tipping over, leading to a fall. The new requirements will also include requirements for tighter leg openings to prevent the baby from slipping through and become trapped underwater, as well as a large permanent warning label, warning parents and caregivers of the need to supervise their children while they are in the backseat at all times. The guidelines include other standards for the latching and locking mechanisms on the bath seat, as well as standard CPSC guidelines for lead content. Bath seat manufacturers will also have to meet CPSC safety requirements for sharp and jagged edges, and small detachable parts that are a suffocation hazard.

Out of the more than 300 nonfatal bath seat accidents and 174 fatal accidents recorded by the Consumer Product Safety Commission, approximately 90% were the result of lack of parental supervision. It’s important for parents to understand that bath seats are not meant to be used as safety devices or playthings for their children. It’s completely inadvisable for you to leave your child alone in the back seat for any amount of time. It’s also important to understand that it doesn’t take a large quantity of water to drown a baby. Children can drown in very little quantities of water. It is also inadvisable to leave the baby in the care of an older sibling or an older child alone in the bathroom.

California injury lawyers would advise the following tips to make sure that there is no adverse incident involving a baby in a bath seat.

Prepare for bath time well in advance. Make sure that all the materials you need -soaps shampoos and lotions-are within arm’s length, so you don’t have to get up to fetch anything

Take time to inspect the backseat often. If there are cracks in the tub or if the latching and locking mechanisms are broken, discard the bath seat.

Besides the new infant bath seats standards, the Consumer Product Safety Commission is working on new safety guidelines for approximately 20 other children’s products, including cribs, bassinets and walkers.

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