OTTAWA — Health Canada warned the maker of a bed-side sleeper for infants "several years ago" that its product didn't meet Canada's safety standards for cribs, but the department didn't move to pull it from Canadian homes, internal records show.
That likely will soon change, a senior executive at Arm's Reach Concepts Inc. told Postmedia News Tuesday, after the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC) and the firm issued a joint recall of Arm's Reach co-sleepers in the United States due to entrapment, suffocation and fall hazards.
The product looks like a traditional playpen or portable crib, except that one side of the bed-side sleeper is lower than the others to allow it to be placed adjacent to the parents' bed for easy access to the infant.
The recall in the U.S. says parents should immediately stop using Arm's Reach bed-side sleepers manufactured before 2002, and only start using it again after downloading instructions to make sure the item is assembled properly.
Jim Dodds, chief operating officer of the California-based Arm's Reach Concepts, Inc., said he expects a recall in Canada to go farther by telling parents to stop using the product altogether.
"A (company) representative is contacting Health Canada now. My suspicion is that they will ask them not to use the product. It will be a different slant on it," Dodds said of a Canadian recall.
About 1,100 were sold in Canada between 1997 and 2001. Dodds said the company stopped selling them years ago when Health Canada told the company its product didn't meet Canadian crib regulations, drafted to make sure there are no hazards when babies are put to bed.
Newly released internal Health Canada records, dated February 2010 and provided to Postmedia News under access to information legislation, confirm the department told the company "several years ago that they couldn't sell the Original Arm's Reach Co-Sleeper in Canada as it weighed too much to be considered a portable crib and did not meet the requirements for a standard crib."
Health Canada did not post a recall notice or issue a safety advisory about the Arm's Reach co-sleeper following this directive to the company.
In the United States, regulators classify the bed-side sleeper as a playpen, placing it under a different set of safety rules, said Dodds. That's why the U.S. recall of 76,000 units involves reissuing of instruction manuals to make sure the product is assembled properly, he added.
When the fabric liner is not used or it not securely attached, infants can fall from the raised mattress into the loose fabric at the bottom of the sleeper or become trapped between the edge of the mattress and the side of the bed-side sleeper, according to the CPSC's recall notice issued Tuesday.
No injuries have been reported in the United States or Canada, but the company has received 10 incident reports from parents of infants in the U.S.
"The incidents generally involve second or third usage of the product who didn't have the instructions," Dodds said of the U.S. recall.
In Canada, Health Canada recommends in a general consumer advisory posted to its website that the safest place for an infant to sleep is alone in a crib. And "co-sleeper products are not recommended by Health Canada. These products present a risk of suffocation and entrapment. Instead use a crib or cradle next to your bed," according to the safe sleep practices advisory.
Health Canada was not immediately available to comment on how it handled the Arm's Reach Co-Sleeper file.
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