Historic Recall of Window Coverings

Recently, an historic recall was issued by the Consumer Product Safety Commisson and the Window Covering Safety Commission. Repair kits are available for the window coverings. Around 50 million sets of Roman blinds and roller shades are being recalled from the market, due to their strangulation risk for children. There have been five child deaths and 16 near strangulations by the cords of Roman shades, and three children’s deaths were linked to roll-up blinds. The CPSC expressed frustration that the massive recall was necessary, saying that the products should have been safer to start with. Individual retailers are also recalling their own products, in addition to the CPSC recall. For instance, Pottery Barn, Walmart and JCPenny have recalled their Roman shades, roll-up blinds and roller shades.

According to the CPSC and the WCSC there are some steps that parents and caregivers can take to help prevent child strangulation in window coverings. For example, make sure that there are no accessible cords on the front, back or sides of window blinds, keep beds, cribs and furniture away from windows, install tension devices to keep cords from being loose, or use cordless window coverings.