IKEA, the world’s largest furniture retailer, has announced it will recall 17.3 million chests and dressers in America and Canada as a reaction to another death caused by the furniture. Surprisingly, China does not seem to affected by the recall.
The dressers being recalled are from the MALM series. Due to a design defect, if the dresser is not installed properly, it will easily fall over, posing a serious threat to the children.
An incident first occurred in Pennsylvania in 2014, when a 2 year old boy was crushed to death by a chest of six drawers. Over the years, the furniture giant has received 299 reports of tip-over incidents involving the chests and dressers, including 144 reports of injuries to toddlers and eight fatalities.
This is not the first time IKEA has recalled its MALM chests of drawers. In June of last year, it declared to recall 36 million chests and dressers after the appearance of a seventh victim. Customers were allowed to choose between a free wall-anchoring repair kit and a full or partial refund.
Despite the last round of recalls, another fatality occurred in May this year, when the MALM dresser fell on a 2 year old sleeping toddler, Jozef Dudek. Following this, IKEA decide to undertake another recall.
According to IKEA’s official website, any MALM chests and dressers higher than 23.5 inches (60cm) are among the recalling list.
However, it seems the recall is exclusive to America and Canada and does not apply to China. We were surprised to find that the products are still for sale on IKEA’s official website of China, in spite of the fact that most of the products meet the requirements of the recall.
Initially China wasn’t included in the last round of recalls either. However, following pressure from customers and AQSIS (General Administration of Quality Supervision, Inspection and Quarantine of the People's Republic of China), they finally decided to issue a call back of 1.6 million dressers in China.
For now, no further statements have been made from IKEA China.
