Because significant amounts of lead in toys has been banned since 1978 in the United States, you may think that your children are safe from this type of exposure. Unfortunately, toys with lead are still too common, and your children can ingest lead if you are not vigilant. You need to be quite careful when you give small children toys that can end up in their mouths.
Lead Dangers
When your child ingests lead, you may not notice any symptoms. You also cannot detect lead through visual inspection, and it has no particular smell. Although you know not to let your children play with antique lead soldiers, other dangerous toys are not obvious. Lead can be found in paint and in plastic. Your child's lead level can only be detected through a blood test. Lead poisoning in children can lead to learning disabilities, weight loss, vomiting, and developmental problems.
Safe Toys
You can do several things to make certain that your child's toys are safe. First, you need to reconsider buying foreign toys.
The laws are strict in this country, and the amounts of lead allowed have been reduced in recent years. Since 2012, the "acceptable" amount of lead in toys for children 12 and under has been 100 parts per million. To keep your children safe, experts recommend buying toys manufactured after 2012 and marketed by companies with a good track record. Dollar stores are not the safest place to buy toys since poorly regulated items sometimes end up there. In fact, any really inexpensive toy is probably open to suspicion. You should also be careful about buying toys at garage sales because you will probably not have the manufacturing information.
The CDC recommends that you check for toy recalls on a regular basis to help eliminate lead from your household. You can check these recalls by visiting this link or by calling 1-800-638-2772.
Testing
Although you can buy home kits to test for lead content, they are not particularly accurate. The only way to be certain of an object's lead content is to take the suspect toys in for a lead test at an approved laboratory. If you fear that the toy contains a significant amount of lead, you should remove it from your child's reach immediately and explain later.
Lead in toys is still a danger, even in the United States. Although the US has stringent rules regarding lead use, other countries may not, so imported toys are suspect. Although some foreign toys are fine, knowing which ones are okay is difficult. New domestically manufactured toys are the safest ones for your children. When it comes to toys, buy American.
Share30 August 2016
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