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Mattel Recalls More Chinese-Made Toys
A 1/8-inch magnet is shown attached to the underside of a dog from the Polly Pocket toy series at the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission during an announcement of the recall of millions of toys manufactured by Mattel Inc. at the commission's headquarters August 14, 2007 in Bethesda, Maryland. According to the commission, The Polly Pocket dolls and accessories have small magnets embedded in the hands and feet that can come loose. If more than one magnet is swallowed they can attract each other and cause intestinal perforation or blockage, which can be fatal. The commission is asking consumers to immediately take the toys away from children and contact Mattel.
(Chip Somodevilla - Getty Images)
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The majority of the recall is related to small but powerful magnets in children's toys. If they come loose, the magnets can pose a choking hazard. But there is also a concern that if a child ingests multiple magnets, they can become attached inside the body, causing intestinal blockages.
Ingesting a magnet can manifest as constipation, fever or stomach ache, making it difficult to diagnose, said Don Mays, a safety expert for Consumer Reports. This has increasingly become a problem as toy manufacturers have in the past few years moved to rare-earth magnets, he said.
There have been more than 30 cases of children injured after ingesting such magnets, according to the CPSC, which has been warning about the potential hazard for a year.
Three of those cases involved children who required surgery after ingesting magnets from one of the products included in yesterday's recall, Polly Pocket dolls. After those cases, the agency recalled 2.4 million of the toys last year. That was expanded to include another 7.3 million Polly Pocket products yesterday.
Mattel said it has since moved to toy designs that lock magnets more securely in place.
The recall also includes 253,000 Sarge toy cars, which include surface paints with lead. The toys, fashioned after a character in the movie "Cars," were made by Early Light Industrial of China, which subcontracted the painting of the cars to Hong Li Da. Early Light provided the subcontractor with paint it had approved, but Hong Li Da used a lead-based paint instead, according to Mattel officials.
"If people had followed the rules in place, we wouldn't have this problem today," Eckert said.
Mattel said it was strengthening its process for preventing the use of lead-based paint. It will only permit paint from certified suppliers and require every batch to be tested, company officials said. It will also conduct random inspections and test every production run of finished toys.
Asked whether the company would consider moving its production from China, Eckert said that was being considered. "We're always reviewing where the optimal place is to make our products," he said.
