Unless you’re the parent of a small child, you may have missed this: The U.S. government has outlawed the sale of drop-down cribs.
The cribs, which have hardware that let you to temporarily drop one side down to reach your child, are functional. They’re cribs, after all. They’re also useful for saving the backs of parents.
The rationale taken by the Consumer Product Safety Commission is that some children have died in these cribs–“more than 30 infants and toddlers in the past decade,” according to the Associated Press.
Published by the Detroit News: http://apps.detnews.com/apps/blogs/watercooler/index.php?blogid=1307
How much more than 30 I don’t know, so let’s round up to 40. That’s four deaths per year.
Four.
The death of any child is tragic, but do these numbers justify an official ban?
According to an undated document published by the same agency, over 275 children have drown in 5-gallon buckets since 1984.
If that document was published this year, that works out to about 10 children a year.
Are buckets next? Or perhaps toilets, which according to this source, have killed 20 children since 1990.
Perhaps the proper response to the risks of drop-down cribs, buckets, and toilets is better diligence on the part of adults.