WTF CPSC??
The Chicago Tribune's Patricia Callahan is reporting that even as it was expanding a consumer warning last week about 300,000 deadly Simplicity bassinets, the Consumer Products Safety Commission and Graco stayed quiet about 200,000 more bassinets of the same design that were sold as Graco products, but were actually made by Simplicity.
Naturally, there's no specific product information available, no model numbers, no manufactured dates, and no recall instructions in place. [UPDATE: Graco has posted a list of affected model numbers on their corporate blog.] Graco reportedly contacted the CPSC the day of their Simplicity announcement to say that Simplicity was making identical bassinets for them until 2004.
On the same day, a children's safety advocate asked the CPSC if there were any Graco products involved in the recall, since some of Simplicity's million cribs of death were sold as Gracos, too? "A spokesman for the safety commission brushed her off, she said."
The rest of the article is an unbelievable tale of eBay and craigslist sleuthing to determine what the CPSC and Graco already knew--and what the current Simplicity has refused to divulge: that there are at least 200,000 more bassinet/co-sleepers with the deadly design still out there.
Un-freakin-believable.
Feds, Graco withheld bassinet warning [chicagotribune.com via dt reader gfr]
UPDATE: Simplicity Bassinet Recall Information [blog.gracobaby.com]
I believe it. I expect it. Our government serves corporations first, consumers second. Well, there may be a few additional special interests between corps and consumers I'm not aware of.
You really need a "Just Plain Evil" tag.
Incidentally, my "Captcha" verification text was "Beelzebub666." Weird.