Christmas lights and holiday decorations will now carry a warning label in New York State for lead.
Governor Kathy Hochul signed legislation requiring that seasonal and decorative lighting products manufactured, sold, or distributed in the state that have an electrical cord casing with lead present must have a warning label.
Any manufacturer who violates this shall be subject to a fine of $500.
Decorative and seasonal holiday lights have been shown to contain potentially unsafe levels of lead. Several independent studies, which followed the Consumer Product Safety Commission‘s standard wipe test to see how much lead would come off on someone’s hands, revealed that some brands contained more than 30 times the levels regulators permit in children’s products. One 2008 study published in the Journal of Environmental Health, found that nearly all the light sets tested had levels that surpassed the Environmental Protection Agency‘s limit for windowsills and floors.
Exposure to lead has been repeatedly proven to be attributed to serious health problems including attacks on the brain and central nervous system, heart and kidney disease, reduced fertility and depression, and severe consequences for children. According to the World Health Organization (WHO), there is no safe blood level concentration. While federal law bans the sale and manufacture of lead in house paint and gasoline and New York enacts stringent limits only on paint on children’s toys and furniture and some glazed tableware, the sale of most other consumer products containing lead in the state are not as strictly regulated.
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