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Monday February 21, 2022
CPSA Authors Were Prescient, Suggests Hoehn-SaricThe Consumer Product Safety Act (CPSA) was an "amazingly prescient piece of legislation," CPSC Chairman Alexander Hoehn-Saric told an ICPHSO audience February 16. It was not just aimed at the safety problems of the early 1970s but gave CPSC tools to adapt to unforeseen modern concerns like nanotechnology and artificial intelligence.
He made the observation in the context of discussing CPSC's upcoming 50th anniversary this October. A large portion of his remarks were a listing of incident rates that dropped over CPSC's existence – on products ranging from refrigerators to garden tractors to bicycles.
On the other hand, he pointed to trends that will inform upcoming work on vulnerable populations. African Americans are over-represented in drowning and generator-CO data, he said. Similarly, despite consistent improvements in pediatric poisonings, the opposite has been the case in recent years among Hispanics. He also gave a nod to the safety challenges associated with aging Americans.
Referring to such issues as "safety equity," Hoehn-Saric linked them to a parallel goal of addressing workforce diversity among CPSC staff. |
