The Nebraska Injury Law Report

Law.com reports that Home Depot has been sued over allegations that its Stand ‘N Seal grout is dangerous:

. . . Stand ‘N Seal is an aerosol chemical spray containing Flexipel — an ingredient that should never have been produced in aerosol form. Two people have died after exposure to Stand ‘N Seal, Ilardi said. Others . . were hospitalized and left with permanent lung damage.

If you or a loved one have been injured due to a dangerous product, please call Keating, O’Gara, Nedved & Peter at 888/234-0621 or fill out the contact form on this site. Your first consultation is free and we handle cases on a contingency fee basis.

To reduce child drownings, New York legislators are debating a law that would require homeowner installed alarms that would sound whenever someone enters an untended pool.

The NY Times article on the debate includes the following sobering statistics:

In a nation of 8.6 million pools and 5.6 million hot tubs, according to industry estimates, every summer seems to have a spate of drownings. State and federal health agencies reported that about 260 children younger than 5 died underwater in 2006, including 2-year-old Shaan Pathak of Hicksville; Jolie Annecco, also 2, who lived in Lindenwood, Queens; and Isha and Ahmad Faniel, 4-year-old twins from Union, N.J.

A 2003 report by the American Academy of Pediatrics estimated that for each drowning, up to four more children suffer near-drownings serious enough to require hospitalizations, many resulting in permanent disability.

Year in and year out, drowning is the second-leading cause of accidental death for children under 14, behind traffic fatalities, according to the United States Consumer Product Safety Commission. For children under 5, pools account for far more drownings than bathtubs and natural bodies of water, according to the National Safety Council and the National Center for Health Statistics.

If you or a loved one have been injured due to the negligence of another, please call Keating, O’Gara, Nedved & Peter at 888/234-0621 or fill out the contact form on this site. Your first consultation is free and we handle cases on a contingency fee basis.

On product recalls, it’s “All China All the Time” these days.

BAKERSFIELD - A New Jersey importer of Chinese-made tires is asking the federal government for help in recalling almost half a million defective tires that may have already contributed to one death.

The tire recall follows other major recalls of Chinese-made products, including pet food, toothpaste, and toy trains, prompting widespread consumer concerns.

Now consumer groups wonder if Chinese-made products are safe, given the recalls made in recent months.

The National Highway Transportation Safety Administration said a New Jersey company—Foreign Tire Sales—has announced a recall of at least 450,000 tires made in China, although who is going to pay for the recall and tire replacements remains in question.

The defective tires, used on light trucks and SUV’s, have been sold under the names of Westlake, Telluride, Compass and YKS.

Lawyers are blaming the tires for a fatal accident last year near Philadelphia.

“Check your tires,” said Jeffery Killino, a lawyer for accident victims. “Make sure that you’re not riding on these tires!”

This tire recall follows several other recent recalls of Chinese-made products, including toothpaste containing a poisonous chemical, contaminated pet food, and Thomas the Train Engine toys decorated with lead paint.

If you or a loved one have been injured due to the negligence of another, please call Keating, O’Gara, Nedved & Peter at 888/234-0621 or fill out the contact form on this site. Your first consultation is free and we handle cases on a contingency fee basis.

More problems from China:

July 5, 2007 — WASHINGTON, D.C. - The U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission, in cooperation with the firm named below, today announced a voluntary recall of the following consumer product. Consumers should stop using recalled products immediately unless otherwise instructed.
Name of Product: Mag Stix Magnetic Building Sets
Units: About 800
Distributor: Kipp Brothers, of Carmel, Ind.

Hazard: Small magnets inside the plastic sticks can fall out. Magnets found by young children can be swallowed or aspirated. If more than one magnet is swallowed, the magnets can attract each other and cause intestinal perforation or blockage, which can be fatal.

Incidents/Injuries: CPSC has received one report of an eight-year-old girl who was hospitalized after swallowing loose magnets. Extensive surgery was required to remove the magnets and repair intestinal perforations.

If you or a loved one have been injured due to a dangerous product, please call Keating, O’Gara, Nedved & Peter at 888/234-0621 or fill out the contact form on this site. Your first consultation is free and we handle cases on a contingency fee basis.

The New York Times had a good article on how disability insurance can be a critical benefit of employment:

Tammy Brown of Bradford, Ark., signed up for short-term and long-term disability insurance after she started working for Wal-Mart Stores when she was 17. Fifteen years later, in December 2004, when she was 32, she learned that she had amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, or Lou Gehrig’s disease, and was told she had two to five years to live. She took the summer of 2005 off to spend time with her children, then 6 and 9, and received short-term disability. She went back to work in a wheelchair for about a year, then left on long-term disability in 2006. She receives about half of her salary now.

“Without disability, we would’ve lost our home, our vehicle,” Mrs. Brown, now 34, said. “We probably would’ve had to move in with my in-laws.”

The family bought a handicapped-accessible van and installed a handicapped lavatory complete with roll-in shower and rails around the toilet as well as two ramps to the house and a lift to help move Mrs. Brown around the home. Now unable to use her hands or arms to any degree or walk, she needs 24-hour care, either from relatives or someone they pay.

“As I look back on it, I don’t know what we’d have done without it,” Mrs. Brown said. “I never thought I’d ever use it. I thought I’d be working at Wal-Mart until I was 60 or 70.”

There are two major types of disability insurance. Short-term coverage, often offered by employers, covers the first part of a disability and may provide income for a week up to a year or two, depending on the policy.Long-term insurance starts after short-term coverage ends and helps replace income for a predetermined period, usually two or five years or when the disabled person retires. It can be offered through work — though usually not free —as well as through private policies.
Even those with a policy through work should consider buying private coverage, as an employer’s policy may be bare-bones, could take a while to begin and will not continue when the employee changes jobs. It may also exclude pre-existing health problems.

If you have a dispute with your disability insurer, please call Keating, O’Gara, Nedved & Peter at 888/234-0621 or fill out the contact form on this site. Your first consultation is free.