Ikea is recalling 29 million dressers and chests after the death of six children. Since 1989, at least 36 children have been injured by unstable Ikea dressers. Three children, all under the age of 4, have been killed by the Malm style alone. The dressers are "front heavy" and prone to tipping over if left unanchored, ABC News reports.
“Enough is enough,” Consumer Product Safety Commission chairman Elliot Kaye told ABC’s David Kerley. “These are inherently very dangerous and unstable products if children are around them.”
As The Wall Street Journal points out, the voluntary recall impacts 50% of the chests and dressers that the company sells in the U.S. In response, Ikea released a statement emphasizing that it distributed a repair kit program last year as part of an anchoring campaign, "to communicate the importance of wall attachments.”
For dressers purchased after 2002, Ikea will either refund the dresser or send a free wall anchor. It will also send a free crew if customers do not want to install the anchor themselves. Customers who own an affected dresser from before 2002 will receive partial store credit. The CPSC recommends that consumers keep children away from those dressers in the meantime.
"We would like to create a culture of attaching chests of drawers to the wall,” Ikea's U.S. president Lars Petersson told Fast Company. “It should be as simple and natural as putting on your seat belt when driving a car.”
Learn more about which chests and dressers are included in the recall here.
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