The bottom line is that flame retardants in pajamas are not supposed to be of help in a disaster like a house fire. They are there to protect from burns from a small open flame such as a candle, gas stove, campfire, or lighter.
There are very strict standards for what pajama fabric must be able to withstand when it comes to a small open flame. Fabrics need to be held to a one-and-a-half-inch flame for three seconds and have no more than an average seven-inch char length.
There are a few exceptions. First, certain fabrics consistently are exempt , because they basically always pass. Cotton is actually quite flammable. Pajamas may also be made snug-fitting , and then they avoid the requirement to be flame resistant.
Even when it comes to the fabrics on the exempt list above, there are some other issues when it comes to both sleeping and open flames. The harm in the 70s was from brominated tris, which could damage DNA, then chlorinated tris, which also was found to mutate DNA. That one is still in use today in infant products and furniture, just not PJs! It seems every flame retardant chemical used widely thus far has ended up being banned because it was so dangerous, and most if not all of the chemicals still used to make furniture and carpet flame-resistant have major health risks.
Even California, which used to have some of the strictest flame retardant requirements, is now banning almost all of them. What would you rather risk: a small, open flame, or 12 hours of exposure to a likely toxic chemical every single night for your kids? Remember that pajamas for babies under 9 months are exempt from this legislation as of Maybe the risk of burn injuries really is too great. Maybe our kids would be landing in the hospital at alarming rates without this legislation.
I know this was tragic for those families. But when it comes to accidents, illnesses, hospitalizations, and deaths, kids being burned, particularly in sleepwear, is a pretty tiny number. Compare that to the rate of childhood cancer: about 11, children under age 15 will receive a new cancer diagnosis this year, and nearly 1, will die. Cancer is the second leading cause of death in children ages 1 through 14, after all types of accidents combined. How many people do you know who struggle with fertility?
How many girls have you seen who seem to be entering puberty at an early rate? How many kids are struggling with learning disabilities?
I guarantee those rates are higher than kids a year. Did burn injuries decrease after the legislation went into effect? Yes, they did. And for that, we can rejoice. On the other hand, since the s many aspects of American daily life have changed.
This research from New Zealand pointed out that although kids being admitted to the hospital for burns in nightclothes did decrease after their similar legislation, here are all the other changes that may have had an effect :. Perhaps the lesson here is simply not to let your kids near open flames in their pajamas? Concerned parents reached a victory in Not everyone was happy with this, and Congress required more scrutiny.
The trade-off may have never been between fire safety and biological harm — but between the suggestion of fire safety and the reality of risk. Smoldering cigarettes had started thousands of deadly fires and, when lawmakers called upon Big Tobacco to create a flame retardant cigarette, they passed the buck.
Textiles and furniture companies stepped up. Touted as safer alternatives, polybrominated biphenyls, or PBBs, appeared in the early s. These chemicals, too, were banned after the manufacturer mislabeled a series of shipments and inadvertently supplemented the diets of thousands of Michigan cattle with brominated chemicals. Millions of people were exposed through meat before the mass culling of chemically-tainted cows that followed. The contemporary PBDE was born.
For the next 25 years, PBDE was the flame retardant of choice; virtually every product that contained polyurethane foam came with a brominated chemical. PBDEs, too, were banned at the federal level in , but their presence in the environment and in older consumer products continues to be a public health concern. Fortunately, Stapleton says, progress has been made. Today, the Environmental Protection Agency and the National Institutes of Health monitor new flame retardants and continue to gather studies on the adverse effects of older chemicals.
And a dozen U. One study of mother-child pairs found the chemical present in every child tested. Most flame retardants are structurally similar to thyroid hormone chemicals, and can easily interact with the thyroid hormone. Studies have found strong associations between exposure to flame retardants and thyroid disorders, as well as poor performance on neurodevelopmental tests and reductions in fertility. Not that there appears to be any safe flame retardant on the market. From randomly selected garments, test three samples, five specimens each, from the longest type of seam.
Rejected units can be destroyed, exported only with CPSC approval , or reworked to improve their flammability resistance. Yes, for sleepwear garments that meet the flammability performance requirements there are additional requirements. Please refer to the regulation for more detailed information.
In general:. Contact the FTC for more information. In addition, even though functional attachments to clothing, such as buttons and zipper pulls, are exempt from the "Small parts" regulation, we recommend that you voluntarily test such attachment on garments up to and including size 2 to ensure that those children cannot choke, aspirate, or swallow those attachments. This communication has been prepared for general informational purposes only. This communication has not been reviewed or approved by the Commission, and does not necessarily represent their views.
Any views expressed in this communication may be changed or superseded by the Commission. The link you selected is for a destination outside of the Federal Government. CPSC does not control this external site or its privacy policy and cannot attest to the accuracy of the information it contains. You may wish to review the privacy policy of the external site as its information collection practices may differ from ours.
The cowboy suit and other similar incidents were the impetus for the passage of the Flammable Fabrics Act , which regulated, among other things, which fabrics could be used for clothing.
No more rayon pile chaps for kids or brushed rayon sweaters for women , as such items had become famous for creating what were widely reported at the time as "human torches. In , the CPSC added additional requirements for children's sleepwear. In the years that followed, both pediatric burn rates and burn severity declined. Abraham Bergman's editorial in Pediatrics captures how enthusiastic pediatricians and burn care specialists were about the CPSC sleepwear regulations:.
The reason was that they were wearing garments that had been treated with a flame-retardant chemical. The burns, therefore, were trivial. The children were quickly treated and sent home. A few short years ago, before flame-resistant sleepwear was on the market, these same children would either have been dead or sentenced to a life of pain and disfigurement. Bergman's enthusiasm for treated fabrics is reflected in medical literature of the late s, which reported lower rates of burns overall, as well as decreased severity.
The Shriners Burn Institute, for example, reported a decrease in overall burn rates. In one year, only one patient had to be hospitalized after sleepwear ignition. All other patients were discharged from the emergency room. The results of the Shriners study seem like cause for celebration. Pediatric burn rates at their hospital went down, as did the percentage of burns caused by clothing ignition. The authors of the Shriners study, however, cautioned against too simple a conclusion, noting that changing fashions a shift from nightgowns to two-piece sets, for example , might be decreasing flammability risk.
The rise of in-hospital burn centers at many large hospitals might be in part responsible for the lower admission rates.
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