IKEA Recalls Crib Mattress over Baby Entrapment Danger
Owners of IKEA baby cribs need to know that certain IKEA mattresses sold with the Swedish retailer’s cribs pose a potential suffocation danger and that the allegedly faulty products have been recalled.
This Consumer Product Safety Commission says the recall involves about 169,000 IKEA Vyssa style crib mattresses manufactured on May 4, 2014, or earlier and sold under the following five model names:
- Vackert
- Vinka
- Spelevink
- Slöa
- Slummer
IKEA has received two reports of infants becoming entrapped between the mattress and an end of the crib. The children were removed from the gap without injury.
The CPSC says consumers should inspect the recalled mattress by making sure the gap is no larger than the width of two fingers between the ends of the crib and the mattress. If the gap is larger at any point, customers should immediately stop using the recalled mattress and return it to any IKEA store for an exchange or a full refund.
The mattresses originally cost about $100, the CPSC says.
The CPSC’s “two fingers” guide for the suspect IKEA mattresses is a good way to check the safety of the mattress in any child’s bed, particularly if the mattress was not purchased with the bed.
In this podcast, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says suffocation is the leading cause of injury death among infants younger than one-year-old, and many of these deaths have been linked to unsafe sleep environments.
Among several ways babies can be injured due to bed or mattress entrapment is becoming wedged between a mattress and a wall or a sleep positioner and the bed or crib frame.
Infant suffocation has also been associated with soft bedding, such as pillows or babies sleeping on a waterbed mattress, and with parents or caregivers rolling on top of or against a sleeping infant in a bed with them.
The CDC recommends an ABC rule for sleeping infants: Babies should be put to bed Alone, on their Backs, in bare Cribs. A crib should have a firm mattress and a fitted sheet. Parents should sleep in the same room as a newborn, but not in the same bed.
