August 10, 2007

The Dangers of Government-Mandated Car Seats


A legislative column by State Senator Mary Lazich (R-New Berlin)

I do not support the nanny state. When the Legislature approved the car seat mandate, I was quite vocal in my opposition, for numerous reasons.

The Wisconsin law that forces parents to put their children under the age of eight in booster seats in motor vehicles is an enforcement and logistic nightmare. The many separate requirements by weight and height for each age category are confusing. Burdens are placed upon large families and carpoolers. Booster seats can be expensive and so can the fines for law violators.

What is even worse than the nanny-state provisions of car seat requirements is that those very car seats mandated by the government can be quite dangerous. The Chicago Tribune has completed an exhaustive study of car seats and found that oversight and testing of car seats is limited, leaving many children at risk of serious injury.

As the Tribune emphasized, “Car-seat makers enjoy a rare advantage among companies. Theirs is the one children's product every parent, by law, must use. And many parents assume all seats are equally safe, so they choose based on what fits their budget or matches their car's interior. But the willingness of some executives to dismiss warnings about potential hazards means parents can buy a car seat without knowing all the risks.”

Car seats are tested less than the car or seat belts.

A trauma nurse in Oregon noticed a plastic notch in the Cosco Touriva car seat while investigating why an 18-month old girl suffered a skull fracture in a low-sped accident. The nurse alerted the company about the danger of a child’s head hitting the hard edge of the notch underneath the cloth cover. Five years and hundreds of thousands of sales of the same car seat later, the manufacturer finally took the notch out of the car seat model.

A marketer once inquired of a co-worker why a car seat manufacturer would continue to produce a model despite safety concerns. E-mail records show the response was, “Why? It still sells.”

Safety experts swear by car seats, claiming they save lives. But even the best models on the market cannot guarantee safety in a serious crash. The Tribune reports that “in 2005, 236 children died and roughly 33,000 were injured while strapped into their safety seats during crashes.”

There is no way to determine if the car seat is to blame because emergency responders do not make that interpretation.

The National Highway Safety Administration (NHTSA) admits testing of car seats needs to be improved. The NHTSA head under President Bill Clinton, Dr. Ricardo Martinez, says the car seat industry’s philosophy has been to meet the standard, not exceed it.

Industry insiders play doublespeak. Concerned that a term like “child safety seat” might heighten consumer confidence and produce lawsuits, attorneys urged companies to call their products, “child restraint systems.”

When parents buy a car seat, they assume the device will provide protection in all kinds of crashes. The truth is car seats are only tested to meet a standard for head-on crashes, not side-impact or rollover situations.

One company, Evenflo did its own testing on one of its models, the On My Way infant seat, and found hooks that attached the car seat to the seat belt fell apart, busting into pieces. However, Evenflo was not obligated to report the problems to the government because the tests were conducted under situations other than those required by federal law.

Here’s a troubling note. The Tribune found that the NHSTA refused to recall seven of the 10 child safety seats that failed its crash tests from 2003 through 2005.

It is outrageous that government mandates car seat requirements, and government then performs inadequate tests of car seats, resulting in less accountability for manufacturers and reduced safety for children.

If you have comments on this or any other issue, please contact me at Sen.Lazich@legis.wisconsin.gov, Senator Mary Lazich, State Capitol, P.O. Box 7882 Madison, WI 53707 or 1-800-334-1442.