‘Ditch The Laundry Detergent Pods’ – Consumer Reports

We often hear about freak accidents where a child is seriously injured or killed due to a seemingly benign product. The first reaction for many parents is to shrug it off and place blame on an irresponsible caregiver.

However, a change in recommendation from Consumer Reports may have you reconsidering where you place blame. They say, despite the best efforts by the industry to improve the safety of laundry detergent pod packaging, the product still injures tens of thousands of kids.

In the first six months of 2015, poison control centers nationwide received 6,046 reports of kids 5 and younger ingesting or inhaling pods, or getting pod contents on their skin or in their eyes, according to the American Association of Poison Control Centers (AAPCC). That’s a pace set to pass the 2014 total of 11,714.

Consumer Reports has revoked their recommendation for any liquid laundry packs due to the increasing danger.

Before you say, “this could never happen to me,” remember pediatricians warn that household accidents are the leading cause of death for children ages 2-5.

Julie Watts
Julie is the consumer-investigative reporter for CBS in San Francisco. Her reports air nationally on CBS stations across the coun ...Read More