The U.S. Consumer Products Safety Commission (CPSC) has published a notice of proposed rulemaking (NPR) for magnet safety standard – 16 CFR Part 1262, due to the unreasonable risk of injury and death associated with children and teens ingesting high-powered magnets.
Inputs gathered from magnet ingestion trends include the following: hazardous use patterns, CPSC recall activity, international standards/prohibitions, ASTM activity, human factors, medical literature and associations, and consumer advocacy groups form the backbone of research for the proposed rule.
To address this risk, the CPSC has proposed a rule, under the Consumer Product Safety Act, to apply to consumer products that are designed, marketed, or intended to be used for entertainment, jewelry (including children’s jewelry), mental stimulation, stress relief, or a combination of these purposes, and that contain one or more loose or separable magnets.
Toys will be exempt from this rule, as toys containing magnets must comply with the mandatory toy safety requirements within 16 CFR Part 1250.
The proposed rule seeks to address the risk of injury or death associated with magnet ingestions, by requiring loose or separable magnets in subject magnet products to be either too large to swallow, or weak enough to reduce the risk of internal interaction injuries when swallowed. Under the proposed rule, each loose or separable magnet in a subject magnet product that fits entirely within the CPSC’s small parts cylinder must have a flux index of less than 50 kG2 mm2.
The CPSC proposes that this rule becomes effective 30 days after the final rule is published in the Federal Register and will apply to all subject magnet products manufactured or imported on or after the effective date.
The public comment deadline for this proposed rule is March 28, 2022.
The proposed rule can be found at:
https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/FR-2022-01-10/pdf/2021-27826.pdf
How Does this Impact You? Contact Us to Discuss
If you have any comments and/or questions, please contact your customer service representative or email: info@us.bureauveritas.com
Download Regulatory Update
DOWNLOAD