Congress Passes Bill Named After 18-Month-Old Who Died After Swallowing Battery

CBS News ^ | AUGUST 5, 2022 | Caitlyn O'Kane

[cuban leaf]

You can never have too many safety laws, I always say.

Actually, no, not really.

[Red Badger]

Not bad parenting, bad batteries.....................

[Yo-Yo]

Thank Goodness we now have common sense battery control.

[MinorityRepublican]

On the other hand, we should make it easier for people to sterilize themselves.

[PGR88]

U.S. Sens. Marsha Blackburn, a Tennessee Republican, and Richard Blumenthal, a Democrat from Connecticut,

I expect this non-stop, stupid and virtue-signalling useless regulation from progressives like Blumenthal, but Blackburn claims to be a conservative.

[GreyFriar]

Why not just require all battery’s to be made no smaller or less in weight that the common building brick? I.e., to me this is just a ‘there ought to be a law’ feel good vote that actually won’t solve the base problem of children figuring out how to dismantle something that one would not expect them to have the ability to do, or their parents not being safety conscious.

I have a 2 year old grand daughter who has gotten good at climbing and getting into places that we think we had made it ‘impossible’ for her to access.

[Jamestown1630]

I don’t know how even the best parent can possibly keep track, every moment, of every item a toddler might find and put in its mouth. Sometimes accidents just happen, and there’s no way we can legislate that away.

[Responsibility2nd]

So billion dollar industry will have to change and modify all of its batteries at a cost of billions and billions of dollars because a parent carelessly left a button battery out for her child to swallow.

[fretzer]

4500 pages?

[MercyFlush]

We need a law that bans all small objects. Because if it saves just one life it’s worth it.

[Political Junkie Too]

require warning labels and require that the warning labels clearly identify the hazard of ingestion

These warning labels will be larger than the items that use button batteries.

-PJ

[gloryblaze]

...Button batteries, also known as lithium batteries, can get stuck in the throat when swallowed and saliva triggers an electric current which can cause a chemical reaction. The esophagus can be severely burned in as little as two hours and it could lead to death ...

I'll admit I've never heard anything about that before.

[mmichaels1970]

The legislation will undoubtedly save lives

I mean...I dunno if I'd go THAT far. Toddlers generally can't read warning labels. I'm betting people have stray watch batteries sitting in junk drawers, on dressers, desks, basically all over. I'd think possibly public service messages might save more lives than legislation.

I do feel for the baby's parents. How awful. How absolutely horribly awful.

My dad was working on a pocket watch the other day and lost track of the tiny watch battery. All-stop til it was found. That's when someone there told me about a toddler who died after swallowing one. As a new grandparent of a one year old, hearing that definitely affected me.

I don't think legislation would have determined whether my dad would have searched high and low for that thing. AWARENESS did.

[mmichaels1970]

I don’t know how even the best parent can possibly keep track, every moment, of every item a toddler might find and put in its mouth. Sometimes accidents just happen, and there’s no way we can legislate that away.

100%.

[albie]

Good grief. This is why it takes a blow torch and a PHD to open a bottle of Tylenol.

Kids swallow stuff. As a parent, it’s your job to see to it that your kid doesn’t swallow the wrong stuff.

[nickcarraway]

Their ability to do that is amazing.

[nickcarraway]

Politicians would never ban their own brains.

[albie]

“The legislation will undoubtedly save lives”

...NO. It’ll raise the price of batteries for everyone. But we’re all in this together, right?

[Tijeras_Slim]

Thank goodness I was born at a time when a law called “The Tijeras_Slim Matchbox Car Wheel up His Nose” would never have happened.