Seats Not Up to the Task of
Protecting Children in Crashes

Though marketed as "family vehicles," very few modern cars, trucks or vans are built or sold with any consideration for the special needs of children.  Most parents correctly realize that in order to safely transport their children, they need specially designed seats.

Many of the devices sold in toy stores and baby shops are not up to the task of protecting children in crashes.  Every year, hundreds of children suffer serious and often fatal injuries in automobile accidents, even though they were restrained in child safety seats or booster seats.  Many of these injuries and deaths could have been prevented.  Most of these children could have survived the accidents without any serious injuries if they had been properly restrained in well-designed, well-built and properly installed child safety seats or booster seats.  Parents, grandparents and others who transport children in vehicles always have good intentions.  Few understand the proper use and installation of child safety seats and booster seats.  An improperly installed seat can actually create hazards.

Often child seat hazards are hidden.  Consumers can not easily detect defective designs, shoddy manufacturing and poorly written warnings and instructions.

The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration and the American Academy of Pediatrics both agree on the following recommendations:

•	Children who weigh less than twenty pounds should be restrained in rear facing infant or convertible child safety seats.
•	Children weighing between twenty and forty pounds and older than one year should be restrained in forward facing convertible child safety seats.
•	Children weighing between forty and sixty pounds should be restrained by the vehicle's three point (lap and shoulder belt) harness in conjunction with a belt positioning booster seat.
•	Children under the age of twelve should not be allowed to ride in the front seat of a vehicle, irrespective of whether or not the vehicle is equipped with air bags. Further, children under twelve should never be belted with a lap belt and no shoulder belt.

The Federal Safety Standards

There is only one Federal Motor Vehicle Safety Standard applicable to child safety seats and booster seats.  FMVSS 213 is an antiquated "performance standard" that sets certain minimum performance standards that child safety seats must meet before they can be sold in the United States.  Many of the child safety seat and booster seat manufacturers boast in their advertising that their products "fully comply" with Federal safety requirements.  Consumers are not told that these minimum requirements are outdated and meaningless in the real world of modern vehicles.  The testing procedure used for child seats and booster seats is nearly twenty years old.  It is a laboratory test that has no semblance whatsoever to modern vehicle design and restraint systems.

Child safety seats and booster seats can fully comply with the minimum performance requirements of FMVSS 213, yet still allow serious and perhaps fatal injuries to properly restrained children.

Parents can not assume that a child car seat or booster seat is "safe" simply because manufacturers advertise that their seats satisfy the minimum Federal safety requirements. Child safety seat and booster seat manufacturers and the Federal Government can and should do more. Other countries, including Canada, Australia and some European nations, have performance standards for child safety seats and booster seats that are far more rigorous than the minimal performance requirements of FMVSS 213. The manufacturers who market child safety seats in the United States are aware of these more rigorous standards, as many of them market and sell child safety seats in these other nations.

Common Problems
and Defects with Child Safety Seats

Problems that can compromise the benefits of child safety seats include:

Manufacturing Defects
Manufacturing defects are commonly encountered when child safety seats fail.  Such defects include defectively manufactured plastic shells, harnesses and accessories.  Any of these defects can lead to serious and perhaps fatal injuries.

Design Defects
Design defects in child seats generally relate to shell design, buckle and latch design, inadequate padding and harness design, just to name a few.  These defects contribute to serious problems including, but not limited to excessive head excursion (forward and/or side movement of the head) and ejection from the seat.

Warnings and Instructions
Proper use and installation of child safety seats is essential for those devices to work properly.  Yet the warnings and instructions that accompany child safety seats are woefully inadequate and, in some instances, wrong.  Most telling in this regard are studies that reveal 80-90% of all child safety seats are improperly installed, primarily due to poorly worded, inadequate and confusing instructions.

Tethers
For decades, the child safety seat industry has been aware of "incompatibility" problems between child safety seats and automobiles.  "Incompatibility" exists when a vehicle's seat belts and/or seats are such that a child safety seat cannot be tightly and properly installed.  A loosely fitting or "incompatible" child safety seat is extremely hazardous because the seats can move, slide or tip forward or to the side in an accident, allowing a child's head to strike dash panels or seat backs. Since the 1970's, the child seat industry and the auto industry have known that much of the "incompatibility" problem can be remedied inexpensively with the use of a "tether strap," which is a short piece of seat belt that attaches the top of the safety seat to the package shelf in the back of an automobile.  Despite this knowledge and the fact that tether straps are standard equipment on every child safety seat sold in Canada, many child safety seat manufacturers have elected not to educate parents in the United States about "incompatibility" and further, not to include a tether strap as standard equipment on most child safety seats sold in the United States.

Common Problems
and Defects with Booster Seats

The efficiency of booster seats can be compromised by virtually all of the same types of problems outlined above with respect to child safety seats. Manufacturing defects, design defects and poorly worded warnings and instructions can pose hazardous dangers for child occupants.

In addition, the type of booster seat parents use for their children is critically important. There are two basic types of booster seats currently on the market: (1) booster-with-shield seats; and (2) belt positioning boosters. The key difference in these seat types is the manner in which child occupants are restrained. Booster-with-shield seats elevate child occupants and restrain them with padded plastic shields rather than the vehicle's seat belt system. Conversely, belt positioning boosters elevate children so that they can be restrained by the vehicle's three point (lap and shoulder belt) harness.

Many of the booster-with-shield seats on the market are hazardous and in fact, may not comply with FMVSS 213. Since these seats do not use the vehicle's three point (lap and shoulder belt) harness, restrained children lack upper body restraint. Further, the shields on these seats tend to concentrate accident forces on child occupant's abdomen, rather than the pelvis and upper torso. Lastly, many booster-with-shield seats fail to provide necessary pelvic restraint. In light of these problems, many child safety advocates, including the sponsors of this site, recommend the recall of all booster-with-shield seats on the market.

(03/21/00)