Filter
Tips' first Irony Award goes for the mass recall of Imperial Tobacco's promotional
lighters.
On December 2, 1998, Health
Canada told Canada's largest tobacco company to pull 800,000 lighters from retail shelves.
The lighters were a threat to
children's health, maintained Health Canada.
The threat didn't come from
the way Imperial Tobacco used these lighters to promote the brands kids are most likely to
smoke.
Nor did it come from their
presence beside candy-bars and chewing gum in convenience and corner stores.
Health Canada took them off
the market because kids could use them: the child resistent mechanism was faulty.
"Tests have shown that
these slighters do not meet safety standards as the child-resistant mechanism can
sometimes unlock when the lighter is dropped, rendering the lighters temporarily not
child-resistant. There have been no reports of injuries or fires in Canada to date."
The results for Health
Canada's tests on the Djeep lighters were obtained by Physicians for a Smoke-Free Canada
under Access to Information laws. Of the 125 lighters tested, 10 failed because they
could be lit without unlocking the child proof mechanism.
The failure rate for the
child-proof mechanism to protect kids from purchasing Imperial Tobacco cigarettes is four
times as high.
No cigarettes have yet been
recalled.
| Imperial
Tobacco Lighters |
Imperial
Tobacco Cigarettes |
|
Childproof mechanism failure rate:
8% |
Sales to Minors failure rate:
33% |
Number of children reported harmed
0 |
Number of children reported harmed
621,000
youth 15-19 current smokers
(NPHS, released Jan 20/99) |
Government response:
Order lighters withdrawn |
Government response:
Fine retailers
No action against tobacco companies |
|
