Next time you build furniture or have it assembled in your home, consider anchoring it to the wall — immediately.
The Consumer Federation of America announced on Thursday that Netherlands-based furniture company IKEA has not done enough to manage the millions of recalls it has for its dressers. Two years ago, the company was the center of the largest product recall in history for its Malm dressers and similar units — about 17.3 million — because of the dangers they posed to children. Last year, the ninth child died from one of the dressers, the CFA said.
IKEA has not provided the CFA updated information on the recalls since January 2017, when it said there had been 175,000 refunds provided to consumers, and that the company had sent more than 700,000 consumers anchoring straps before and after the recall, according the CFA. IKEA has reached out to consumers through television ads, social, digital and print advertising and emails to more than 13 million consumers, a spokesperson said in a statement to MarketWatch.
Children are sent to the emergency room almost every half-hour because of tipped furniture or a falling television, according to the Consumer Product Safety Commission. One father prevented it firsthand recently, caught on his home security camera, when his child began climbing on an unanchored bookcase, parenting website Fatherly.com reported. He was able to stop the furniture from falling and save his child just in time.
Other children aren’t so fortunate. A child dies every 10 days from tipped over furniture, according to the CPSC. There were 514 fatalities involving falling furniture between 2000 and 2016, and 84% were children. Another 13% were seniors and the remaining 4% were of adults. Of the children who died, 73% were from falling televisions, according to a 2017 CPSC report.
Substantially more people are sent to the emergency room from falling furniture. There were almost 31,000 trips to the ER, more than half of which were for children. More than a third were adults between 18 and 59 years old and the 12% were for seniors. Aside from TVs, the most dangerous pieces were tables, dressers or bureaus, and shelves or bookcases.
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Most furniture comes with warning signs and hardware to anchor furniture to walls. In 2016, IKEA recalled 29 million chests and dressers for adults and children, after three children died in separate incidents. The Swedish furniture company paid $50 million in settlements to the families of the three children as a result.
“Regardless of design and construction, a dresser is only safe when attached to the wall properly,” an IKEA spokeswoman told MarketWatch earlier this year. “Tip-over is a serious issue for the whole industry.” The company said it’s been offering wall-attachment hardware since the 1990s and, in March 2015, launched a campaign called “Secure It!” to educate consumers on the hazards of unsecured furniture.
