The Center for Environmental Health (CEH) recently tested about 250 toys and children’s accessories from local Bay Area and San Diego retailers, including Target, WalMart, TJ Maxx, Tuesday Morning, Sears, Walgreens and other stores this fall and then had said toys tested for lead (pdf). Although lead has been banned from toys here in the US, seven of the toys were found to contain high levels of lead including a seemingly innocent, Mattel Barbie bicycle accessory set and a Disney “Tinker Bell” necklace set.

While the bike accessories and necklace contained the most lead, the CHE also found levels of lead …read more

The New York Times reports that there are yet more problems with lead levels in Chinese-manufactured toys.
“Amid a fresh wave of toy recalls yesterday, a consumer advocacy group said it had found hazardous levels of lead in many toys made out of vinyl plastic, potentially expanding the scope of testing and recalls of contaminated toys.
A random testing of more than 50 plastic toys found high lead content in 11 of them, according to Mike Schade, a campaigner for the Center for Health, Environment and Justice, which helped organize the testing.”
Among the results of the …read more