Two weeks after Fisher-Price recalled its Rock ‘n Play Sleeper after a Consumer Reports story linked it to 32 infant deaths, Kids II has announced that it is recalling nearly 700,000 inclined baby sleepers due to five infant fatalities.
The Kids II Rocking Sleepers were sold from March 2012 through April 26, 2019 for approximately $40 to $80 at major retailers including Walmart, Target and Toys R Us and online, according to news reports. They were sold under the Ingenuity, Bright Starts, Disney Baby and DreamComfort brands.
According to the Consumer Product Safety Commission, the fatalities involving Kids II sleepers occurred “after the infants rolled from their back to their stomach while unrestrained, or under other circumstances.”
The American Academy of Pediatrics does not recommend inclined sleep products or any other products for sleep that require restraining a baby.
Alan Feldman, a product liability attorney and co-founding partner at Feldman Shepherd Wohlgelernter Tanner Weinstock Dodig LLP, said that “when children’s products are used in an intended and foreseeable way, manufacturers can — and must — be held legally accountable when children are seriously injured or killed.”
According to Feldman, “it is critical for manufacturers of children’s products to ensure that their products are safe by conducting a hazard analysis and designing their products so that the most vulnerable segment of society is protected from needless harm. Unfortunately, this is another tragic example of a product manufacturer not living up to its responsibility.”