• Six manufacturers of V-shaped accordion style baby gates have agreed to voluntarily halt further production and distribution of the gates, which have been linked to at least eight deaths and 23 non-fatal accidents. But 10 to 15 million gates remain in use across the United States and the voluntary halt doesn't prevent retailers from continuing to sell the baby galtes now in their inventories.
The voluntary agreement was reached with the Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC) and took effect January 31. CPSC contends the gates present a strangulation hazaird in the V-shapes along the top edge of the gate and in the diamond-shape openings in the gate's body. In October 1984, an 11-month-old child in Meridian, Idaho, died from strangulation when his head became entrapped in a gate's diamond-shaped opening.
