Personal Injury Blog

Little Progress on Window Blinds Safety Plans

January 9th, 2012
window blinds safety

There has been little progress on improving window blinds safety plans

Progress on improving the plans for window blinds safety has stalled, as manufacturers stubbornly refuse to comply with demands by the Consumer Product Safety Commission to phase out corded blinds.

Instead, manufacturers of these corded blinds are choosing alternatives to what federal regulators have asked for.  The alternatives, as any San Diego defective product attorney will tell you, are simply not adequate.

The Consumer Product Safety Commission has told the window coverings industry to enact strong standards to eliminate the strangulation hazards associated with corded blinds.  There have been several incidents reported from around the country in which children have been strangled to death from cords hanging from window blinds.  In other cases, children have narrowly escaped fatal injury, when parents and caregivers were able to reach them in time to remove the cord from around the neck.  These incidents have been simply too numerous to place the blame on parental failure to supervise.  In other words, this is a defective product that the industry has not been able to make any safer.

The Consumer Product Safety Commission last year gave the window blinds industry a deadline of October 2011 to enact stronger standards for these blinds.  However, that deadline went ignored.  According to manufacturers, it is not possible to completely eliminate accessible cords from windows.  Therefore, the industry has proposed an alternative.  This alternative consists of tension devices or tiedowns.  These devices are made of plastic, screwed into the wall or window sill and are meant to be used to open and shut the window blinds using a sort of pulley system.

However, federal regulators do not believe that these devices are safe enough, or will eliminate the risk of strangulation.  What the system developed by the industry does is reduce the risk that a child will pull the tight cord around his or her neck.  However, it is not a foolproof method.  For one thing, the devices can break easily.  For another, they may not be installed properly.  Another proposal that the industry is putting forward is requiring a product label warning parents against using these corded blinds in their homes if there are children in the house.  The label advises people to consider cordless alternatives if they have children.  However, the label stops short of actually warning parents against using corded blinds if they have children in the home.

It appears to San Diego defective product attorneys that the window covering industry does not want to lose a  sizable portion of its market by absolutely warning against the use of corded blinds in homes with children.  However, the fact is that these blinds are extremely dangerous to children.  Even the Window Covering Safety Council recommends that parents install only cordless windows in children’s bedrooms.

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