Death of 6 children causes Ikea to recall 29 million dressers & chests

The death of a third child from falling Ikea children’s bedroom cabinets has prompted the company to voluntarily recall on Monday 29 million dressers and chests. At the same time, Ikea offered to refund buyers the cost of the bedroom furnishing or provide a repair kit to anchor the dresser or chest to the wall.

ABC reports that a total of six children have been crushed to death by Ikea chests since 1989, with all victims under 4 years old. It had also injured 36 other children, according to the Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC).

The latest victim was the 2-year-old son of Jaquelyn Collas of Pennsylvania. The Ikea MALM dresser pinned the boy to his death in February 2014. When Collas found her son pinned on his bed by the dressed, he did not have a heartbeat. The mother tried to revive him using CPR, but medics pronounced the tot dead a few hours after, leading Collas to file a lawsuit against Ikea in May 2015.

However, Ikea denies there is any manufacturing defect on its products or insufficient warning. The furniture maker says that in 2015, it created a repair kit programme to inform consumers of the importance of attaching their furniture to the wall, reports CNN Money. Ikea distributed 300,000 kits in 2015 to buyers who did not use their original hardware.

The programme was put in place because statistics say that one American child dies from furniture, appliances or TV sets tipping over every two weeks. Ikea acknowledges, “There are still unsecured products in consumers’ homes, and we believe that taking further action if the right tin to do.”

For furniture made between 2002 and 2016, the buyer would be entitled to 100 percent refund, while furniture older than 2002 would qualify the owner to a partial store credit. If the owners do not want to install the wall anchor, Ikea would send a crew to do it, says CPSC.

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