CPSC Announces New Furniture Tip Over Statistics on Child Injury and Death
71 Children become Victims every day – that’s 3 per hour!
By Thomas R. Reich PhD
The newest major retailer being sued by parents of a badly injured child for alleged faulty furniture tip over is Babies R Us. Along with the manufacturer of their store branded Dresser the law suit states that they did not including tip-restraints and warning labels with the dresser when the product was sold to the consumer.
Consumer Product Safety Commission, who sponsors ASTM (a voluntary standards Organization), catalyzed in part by two bills introduced in the U.S. House of Representatives titled “The Katie Elise and Meghan Agnes Act (HR 2738 2005 and 2009). These acts would have created a law that would have avoided many of the injuries and law suits caused by needless tip and falls of poorly balanced furniture.
HR 2738 asked for warning labels and restraints to be sold with furniture, the bill still sits unacted upon in the Washington gridlock. But the Consumer Product Safety Commission has released ASTM, a voluntary furniture safety standard for warnings and tip restraints.
New Box Products leads the way with its cutting edge “Safe-T-Hold”. This unique patented device has a much more thorough solution than the old fashioned “wall strap” solution. While the anchor still attaches directly into the furniture and the wall stud, it has a unique removable attachment allowing for temporary movement of the furniture for cleaning, then returning to firm anchoring to the wall.
The old fashioned “strap” or “cable” allows the furniture to begin to fall and greatly increases the possibility of devise failure, resulting in child injury and death. With the New Box Product “Safe-T-Hold”, this risk is alleviated and the children are safe.
The question today is “who should be responsible for preventing tip-overs? Should it be the manufactures? The stores that sell the furniture? The consumers, who are mostly parents, grandparents, and responsible adults who may or may not have children in their home? All three?” asked nonprofit advocacy group Meghan’s Hope.
The New Box Furniture Anchor “Safe-T-Hold” is available in your favorite hardware store and ends the blame game. With a small afternoon project, you can protect you children, grandchildren and guests from becoming a statistic. Who should be responsible? No one if the Safe-T-Hold solution is installed!
Worlds Best Furniture Anchor Safe T Stop by New Box Products; The Right thing to do!
“When I heard this story on the news I knew we had to do something, something different like the New Box Safe T Stop” said Tom Muskopf in an interview with the press recently. “New Box Products already developed and patented the Drawer Slider and Stop device, to stop heavy drawers from falling on children, but I knew I could do more”
Muskopf, a contract engineer for Lockheed Martin among other impressive employers over the years, was sitting in New Box Products well equipped private lab as he continued “there are a lot of furniture anchors on the market… they are complicated, unattractive and difficult to install correctly. I knew we could do much better.” He took a deep breath and continued “With the New Box approach, our furniture anchor, called the Safe T Stop, is so simple to install it takes only a one frame diagram to describe. It leaves room for access behind the furniture without allowing the item to fall a short distance, which greatly increases the holding power of the attachment to the wall. This is true even if that attachment is to plaster board without benefit of a stud.”
He continued the explanation “the main device out there, the one available from major outlets like IKEA, involves a complicated cable contraption. This is supposedly to facilitate movement of the chest of drawers to access behind it for cleaning. However, this loose cable can allow the chest to begin to fall forward and snap to a stop at the end of the length of cable, causing an incredible increase in the stress on the attachment to both the wall and the piece of furniture. If either of these attachments fail, the chest falls and the danger and hazard is as bad as ever. The New Box solution anchors the piece of furniture securely to the wall while still allowing for a small space for cleaning and electrical cord plug-ins.”
The story that had upset Tom Muskopf so deeply was as follows:
A mother told of a disaster on December 18, 2004, with the death of her young child, the first widely reported such incident involving the tip and fall of light weight furniture…..
“She was the second born of a twin set, her older brother arriving 4 minutes before she was born. She arrived feet first, feisty, and ready to make her presence known, literally kicking her older brother out of the womb. That was October 23, 2001, one of the happiest days of my life.
On the morning of December 18, 2004, I awoke to find Meghan lifeless under her dresser. I assumed she was climbing the drawers. We did not hear the dresser fall, for it fell on top of her. She did not or could not cry. She died within minutes – suffocated under the weight of the dresser.
Suddenly I was living every parent’s nightmare. My heart shattered. All because of something that could have easily been prevented, had we known and understood the dangers. It was the worst day of my life.”
A few dollars and a few minutes installing a New Box Safe T Stop would have saved her life. That’s all it takes to safely secure a piece of furniture to the wall with the New Box Products Safe T Stop Solution. All it takes is putting a few holes in a wall and a piece of furniture. Walls can be fixed, broken hearts and families cannot.
Since this incident, we here at New Box Products have been shocked to learn that furniture and television tip-over incidents are an all-too-common occurrence in this country. In fact, according to the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC), on average, tipped furniture or falling televisions send a child in the U.S. to the emergency room every 24 minutes in 2015 and that number seems to be on the increase in 2016. Each of these incidents could be prevented if parents and caregivers installed simple, low-cost furniture anchors like the Safe T Stop from New Box Products.
Parents and caregivers can find details about the dangers of unanchored furniture along with key safety steps to take for anchoring furniture with products like the Safe T Stop at AnchorIt.gov. The steps include:
Televisions should only be placed on furniture designed to hold a television, such as television stands or media centers.
Mount flat-screen TVs to the wall or to furniture to prevent them from toppling over.
Televisions that are not wall mounted should still be anchored to the wall or base furniture.
CRT televisions should only be placed on furniture designed to hold a television, and should be anchored to the wall or the TV stand.
Remove items that might tempt kids to climb, such as toys and remote controls, from the top of the TV and furniture.
Keep heavier items on lower shelves or in lower drawers.
Existing furniture can be anchored with New Box Products Safe T Stop bracket. New furniture, such as dressers, sold with anti-tip devices. We suggest purchasing the safer and better engendered New Box Products Safe T Stop Furniture Anchor, there is a big difference.
If your drawers do not have stops, install New Box Products Safety Sliders and Stops, they are inexpensive and will avoid years of potential heartbreak if they are able to stop a falling drawer from injuring your child or grandchild.
If you have children in your home, even if they are not your own children, we at New Box Products urge you to visit AnchorIt.gov. Use the tips and the information provided there to help you secure your furniture and televisions to protect children. The threat might be serious, but the solution is simple: anchoring is easy, inexpensive and only takes five minutes with the simple to install solutions from New Box Products and our inexpensive and easy to install Safe T Stop.
