A coalition of US NGOs is calling on children’s car seat manufacturers to phase out the use of flame retardant chemicals.
The Car Seat Detox Challenge campaign has been launched by the Ecology Centre in partnership with Safer Chemicals, Healthy Families, Healthy Babies Bright Futures, the Getting Ready for Baby coalition and Safer States.
The centre says the flame retardants historically used in car seats to meet federal flammability standards include known carcinogens, hormone disruptors and developmental toxicants.
A study it published last December, Travelling with Toxics, said 87% of car seats tested by the group in 2016 contained brominated flame retardants (BFRs). The group analysed 15 car seats from the US and UK. All contained the chemicals and 13 contained BFRs, which it says are persistent, bioaccumulative and often toxic.
The group says halogenated compounds (including BFRs), triaryl phosphates and other added toxic flame retardant chemicals have been shown to migrate out of products to contaminate air and dust.
None of the car seats tested contained chlorinated tris, which was found in three of 15 car seats tested by the centre in 2014. Although the market has shifted from the use of chlorinated flame retardants, says the group, these have been replaced with “a number of chemicals with uncertain hazards”.
The NGO coalition has written to several car seat manufacturers, asking them to commit to developing a public safer chemicals policy and action plan to address hazardous chemicals over the next year.
It says federal motor vehicle safety standards can be met without the use of flame retardants. This year, the manufacturer Uppababy released the Henry MESA car seat, which uses wool to make the fabric naturally fire resistant.
The NGO campaign recommends that car seat manufacturers’ chemical policies should:
- create a restricted substances list, or update their existing one, to address halogenated and other toxic flame retardants, heavy metals, perfluorinated chemicals, PVC plastic, ortho-phthalates, antibacterial chemicals of concern, and other chemicals “known or suspected of causing cancer, hormone disruption, neurotoxic and other serious chronic health effects”;
- ensure products comply with the list through third party laboratory testing; and
- conduct alternatives assessments using a tool such as GreenScreen to ensure chemicals of concern are not substituted with other harmful chemicals.
Melissa Sargent, of the Ecology Centre, told Chemical Watch that although no companies have made the commitment yet, she hopes they will take notice of an online petition with more than 38,000 signatures calling for action.
“It’s not that these companies want to put anything out there that is toxic to children, it’s just where the technology is right now. We’re hopeful we’ll have some positive feedback from companies.”
But the Juvenile Products Manufacturers Association (JPMA) says car seats do not expose children to hazardous chemicals.
Executive director Kelly Mariotti told Chemical Watch the NGOs “have failed time and again to produce a board-certified toxicology report to support these claims, which is misleading to parents.”
She added that her members “take great care in meeting and exceeding the strict federal and state flammability requirements for juvenile products, and whenever possible, work to find ways to meet regulatory mandates and manufacture products as naturally as possible.”
Bryan Goodman of the American Chemistry Council said flame retardants on the market are subject to review by the US EPA and other regulatory bodies around the world, “so consumers do not have to choose between fire safety and chemical safety”.
In response, the Ecology Centre said it relies on academic and independent research for health data and a number of studies have raised concerns about the widespread use of flame retardants.