Refrigerator magnets with leaded paint coatings
Cord holders made of PVC plastic
and the cord holders for your e-gadgets may pose hazards to health and safety.
The EcoWaste Coalition, an environmental watchdog group, made this
precautionary warning after finding brightly painted animal fridge magnets and
cartoon-embellished cord holders positive for lead, a toxic chemical added to
some paints and polyvinyl chloride (PVC) plastics.
The group’s advisory coincided with the global observance of World Consumer
Rights Day today, March 15 and was issued to promote public awareness on the
rights of consumers to product information and safety.
The group on March 11 purchased six samples of refrigerator magnets worth P10
each and 15 samples of cord holders worth P35 each from street vendors in
Divisoria, Manila and had them screened for toxic metals.
As per chemicals screening using a portable X-Ray Fluorescence (XRF) device,
the group found all six samples of paint-coated animal magnets positive for
lead up to 18,100 ppm, way above the 90 ppm limit for lead in decorative
paints.
The group also detected lead up to 5,616 in all but one of the 15 samples of
PVC cord holders.
“The colorful animal figures attached to round magnets are individually packed
in clear plastic and carried no labeling details, depriving consumers of their
right to basic product information,” said Thony Dizon, Coordinator, EcoWaste
Coalition’s Project Protect
“The cord holders designed with iconic cartoon characters are incompletely labeled,”
he added.
None of the products indicated lead as an active ingredient. Lead is a
chemical poison that can harm the brain and the central nervous system and
damage other body organs, with children under six most at risk.
“The absence of such essential information about the product and their chemical
composition goes against the consumer interest as guaranteed under Republic Act
7394 or the Consumer Act of the Philippines. Consumers should and must
insist on their right to know,” Dizon emphasized.
“While the refrigerator magnets and the cord holders are not meant to be used
as toys, they could easily pass as toys to imaginative and playful children,”
he said.
“Kids will find these items very attractive and innocently play, bite and chew
on them, directly exposing them to lead hazard via ingestion,” he warned.
Even so, the most common way for children to ingest lead is still through
lead-containing dust and soil that gets onto their hands and mouths, he
clarified.
According to the World Health Organization (WHO), “the most critical
consequence of low level lead toxicity in utero and during childhood is
damage to the developing brain and nervous system.”
brain injury from exposure to lead in
early life, according to the WHO, are loss of
intelligence, shortening of attention span
and disruption of behavior.”
Aside from lead exposure hazard, the sampled refrigerator magnets and cord
holders may also pose choking hazard. The magnets, for example, are not
securely attached and can be easily swallowed by children, the EcoWaste
Coalition warned.
To prevent lead exposure and choking hazard, “we advise those who have already
bought such items to keep them out of children’s sight and reach,” the group
said.
-end-
Reference:
http://www.who.int/ceh/publications/childhoodpoisoning/en/
Additional information:
1. REFRIGERATOR MAGNETS: In terms of lead content, the ladybug
refrigerator magnet had 18,100 ppm of lead; the squirrel refrigerator magnet,
10,900 ppm; the cow refrigerator magnet, 6,720 ppm; the fish refrigerator magnet,
5,287 ppm; the snake refrigerator magnet, 5,126 ppm; and the elephant
refrigerator magnet, 1,322 ppm.