Good morning and welcome to this public meeting of the United States Consumer Product Safety Commission There is one item on the agenda for today CPSC staff will brief the commission this morning on a draft final rule Which would establish a safety standard for magnet sets The CPSC staff who will be briefing us this morning are mr. Andrew Camaros From the office of the Attorney General and dr. Jonathan midget Children's hazard team leader in the office of hazard identification and reduction Before asking mr. Camaros to begin however, I've been asked by Commissioner Ann Marie Burkle She was not joining us today to read a brief note from her Hope and quote I have decided that I will not participate in today's Commission meeting or vote on the final rule for magnet sets The mandatory standard being considered would apply to the same magnet sets that are subject of a pending CPSC administrative case Which is scheduled for trial in December? Since the Commission may be called upon to review the administrative law judges decision in that case I do not think it is appropriate for me to vote on a standard addressing the same magnet sets at this time I appreciate the chairmen's allowing the statement to be read closed quote and Now mr. Camaros if you could please begin the staff briefing Thank You chairman commissioners. Good morning The purpose of this meeting is for staff to discuss The information and analysis underlying its recommendation that the Commission Issue a safety standard for magnet sets under section 7 and section 9 of the CPS a CPS a Section 7 of the CPS a authorizes the Commission to issue consumer product safety standards that consist of performance requirements and requirements for warnings or Instructions the requirements that are issued under section 7 must be reasonably necessary to prevent or reduce an unreasonable risk of injury associated with the product Section 9 of the CPS a sets forth the process to be followed In issuing a consumer product safety standard the Commission has the option of starting the rulemaking Processed by the issuance of an advanced notice of proposed rulemaking or a notice of proposed Rulemaking in this instance the Commission chose to begin with a notice of proposed rulemaking that was published in the Federal Register on September 4th of 2012 The NPR that was published included the text of the proposed regulation a preliminary regulatory analysis An initial regulatory flexibility analysis and a request for comments from the public Section 9 also requires the Commission to provide an opportunity for the public to make oral presentations regarding the subject matter of the proposed rule and To that end a public hearing was held here at headquarters on October 22nd of 2013 and There were several participants who Made statements and presented information relevant to the proposed rule Section 9 requires that the the rule include a final regulatory analysis The regulatory analysis has to include a description of the potential benefits and costs of the rule a description of alternatives that the Commission has considered to the rule that is That has been proposed and a summary of significant issues raised by comments on the preliminary regulatory analysis Section 9 also sets forth the findings The Commission must make to issue the final rule The Commission must make appropriate findings regarding the degree and nature of the risk intended to be addressed by the rule The approximate number of products subject to the rule The need of the public and effective the rule on the utility cost and availability of the product and Other means of achieving the objective of the rule while minimizing adverse effects on competition Finally section 9 provides that the Commission shall not issue The rule the draft final rule unless it makes the following findings That the rule is reasonably necessary to reduce an unreasonable risk of injury That the rule is in the public interest That if there is a voluntary standard that addresses the product and the risk of injury Compliance with that voluntary standard is not likely to result In an adequate reduction of the injuries or that substantial compliance with the voluntary standard is unlikely in this instance As stated in the briefing package. There is no voluntary standard for Magnets as it's as they're defined in the draft final rule the Commission also must make findings regarding the Expected benefits of the rule and that those bear reasonable relationship to its costs and That the rule imposes the least burdensome requirement that prevents or adequately reduces the risk of injury Jonathan Midgett will now discuss the information and analysis that is contained in the briefing package It was presented to the Commission Last week that underlies the staff's recommendation that the Commission issue the draft safety standard for magnet sets I'm going to review what was mentioned in the Notice of Proposed Rulemaking Specifically, let's start with what the product is itself. We have aggregated masses of strong powerful magnets that are marketed as sculptures Sculpture construction toys puzzles stress relievers They're commonly sold in sets of 125 to 216 But some sets have as many as a thousand spheres in the set Most of them are four millimeters to six millimeter spheres, but other Shapes have been marketed such as cubes a mass of cubes Some of the products are labeled for users 14 years old and up some say for adults only some bear no age labeling at all The magnets are powerful. There are many times the attraction force allowed by the toy standard These are very very strong magnets This rule would apply to all magnet sets that fall into the definition as Stated in the in the rule whether they're marketed to adults or children as toys or not the Products are primarily manufactured overseas and approximately 2.7 million sets have been sold During the time of the economic analysis. That's from 2009 through mid 2012 Current sales are dramatically lower than when they were prior to see if yet CPSC enforcement actions Probably due to the actions themselves The retail prices of these sets typically range from 20 to 45 dollars the average about 25 I'd like to discuss the National electronic injury surveillance system estimates of Injuries associated with these products This is likely an undercount of the true total number of incidents, but from from January of 2009 to December of 2013 There are estimated about 580 cases per year associated with these products and there's an estimated 7,700 cases of Emergency department treated ingestions involving magnets type unknown or other type of magnets for that same period most of that Estimate is associated with magnets of an unknown type and it is possible that if more information were available on those cases some portion of them would be identified as involving magnet sets themselves Since the NPR now there's been no statistically significant change in these numbers But these products do produce severe injuries And I just want to briefly mention the types of injuries. These are associated with Pressure necrosis which is caused by a clamping of the magnets on either side of some part of the gastrointestinal tract Which causes the cells in that place to die perforations of the intestine fistulas gastrointestinal obstructions Twisting of the intestines called volvulus And these problems can lead to infection peritonitis sepsis and death There are acute and long-term health effects such as gastrointestinal bleeding leakage Rupture of the intestines infection temporary paralysis of the normal contractions in the intestine The victims may need a feeding tube. They may need intravenous feeding and they may need a colostomy bag There's compromised digestive function and nutrition accompanied by diarrhea cramps and malabsorption of food There can be scar tissue and adhesions in the intestines which compromise GI functions may require future surgeries and in girls the scar Tissue associated with these injuries can't affect their ability to have children in the future and Associated with all of these injury patterns. There's the elevated Adverse health effects associated with multiple x-rays We have data available to us that comes through other avenues besides the National Electronic Injury Surveillance System We call these non nice data in in the cases reported to the CPSC we have Magnet related ingestions for this time period from 2009 to 2014 a hundred reported cases classified as magnet sets or possibly being magnet sets The most commonly reported age group is the four to twelve year old age category This is no different than what was reported in the notice of proposed rulemaking But now we also have to add to the record one death a 19 month old child Died from ischemic bowel due to magnets the victim had been diagnosed at an urgent care facility as having a probable virus the day before her death The met medical examiner described the seven magnets which were found in the child small intestine as spheres Which are point five centimeters in diameter and quote very magnetic Staff believes the magnets involved in this case came from a magnet set based on the review of the recovered magnets So just to summarize We have a vulnerable population at risk With a an injury mechanism that's very difficult for parents to foresee Diagnosis is very difficult for the medical community The severity of the injuries is extremely high and there are acute long-term health effects associated with those injuries So in light of these facts We have proposed a rule With limited scope the magnets Covered by the proposed rule are intended for specific purposes Many of the commenters on our proposed rule misunderstood this they thought we were trying to regulate all magnets This is not all magnets. This is magnet sets sets of magnets and The requirements that we proposed are based on the ASTM f 963 toy standard There are essentially two avenues One is to limit the size of the magnets so the magnets cannot be so so large and they must not fit in the small part cylinder Which is a well well established and readily available tool More the magnets must be of a weaker strength the strength must not Exceed 50 kilogal squared millimeter squared. Oh After proposing this rule We have had the opportunity for public for the public to submit comments and we had a public hearing as My colleague mentioned earlier in October of last year in addition to the public hearing we received more than 5,000 comments from the public on this issue Staff coded the public comments into about 30 different categories as a team there were highly repetitive comments, but There were some in support of the rule and some in opposition to the rule and we responded to those arguments all of them Collectively in the briefing packets, which you have Whether the argument was made by one consumer or by hundreds of consumers Everyone has a voice and In staff staff's opinion none of the comments provided any new information that would require significant changes to the proposed rule I will summarize some of the comments for you in general. We received many comments about the utility of the subject products Consumers opposed to the rule like and magnet sets to science kits Therapy therapeutic aids for stress relief concentration aids for people with ADHD and As a bonafide artistic medium Essentially, they believe in these comments that they're the Products value exceeds the cost to society of the injuries Supporters of the proposed rule called the magnet sets Novelties and distractions that have many other alternatives and therefore what little value they offer to society is easily replaced or substituted by other things We received a number of comments about impacts on businesses, especially the potential loss of jobs and Perhaps the creation of a black market for magnet sets after the regulation was passed Some people commented on our risk analysis. They believe that Other products have higher injury rates when there were many Comparisons to other products on the market such as balloons Trampolines and household chemicals are brought up many times, but but there were there were dozens of different types of product categories mentioned in comparison Some commenters say that ingesting the magnets is an unreasonable misuse and Manufacturers shouldn't be responsible for that and other people in support of the rule said that ingestion is a foreseeable misuse of these products and manufacturers should know about it We received numerous comments about the warnings both both for and against some people said that the warnings currently were sufficient Others said they were insufficient and some people said well what there could be improved so more warnings are what we really need Many comments mentioned warnings a number of comments mentioned Parenting and the responsibility of caregivers and injury prevention in general and the role of supervision But people in support of the rule also noted the obscure nature of the danger and and doubted whether parents actually could adequately supervise a house containing such products a Number of comments were received about injury prevention people mentioned child resistant packaging could be a possible alternative Or the use of biterance which are chemicals embedded on the surface of a magnet set or any product in general biterance Are supposed to deter ingestion because they make the product taste bad Some people argued that public education is all that's warranted and we shouldn't do anything more and some people suggested limiting sales to adults There were a number of opinions of the medical community summarized in your briefing package as well most medical represented representatives of the medical community Cited the severity the injuries and the long-term effects and at least one Commenter requested a revision of the flux index based on better anatomical data There were some engineering issues covered People question the capabilities of magnet sets or what a magnet set would look like with a flux index index lower than 50 They question whether it would be useful for anything Some people question the effectiveness of the flux index limit for limiting the the injury Mechanism and some people noted problems with measuring flux index and these issues are have been answered by our engineers in the briefing package We received a lot of comments about the rulemaking process itself and comments on government in general and how Government should operate how it should work people discussed the scope of the proposed rule and felt it was too broad Too broadly worded they discussed the rate of injury and felt like the injuries were not sufficient enough to warrant a rulemaking They questioned the commission's authority to regulate the products at all They made many comparisons to other products and questioned the rulemaking procedures and the sections of The law that were being used to promulgate the rule Many people said that the magnet sets are not defective. They're acting just as they're supposed to and therefore should not be regulated there was many accusations that the rule was arbitrary and Should not proceed on that basis and people in support of the rule Cited many many times that the product has low utility but very high severity injuries And so those two things counterbalance one another and they believe that the rule should move forward to prevent these injuries So in light of all those comments, we we are still of the mind to recommend a draft final rule And so we have made a few changes Clarifications and and improvements of the the definition that was in the NPR The definition of the magnet set is now as I've shown on the screen And I'll read it in part My magnet set is any aggregation of separable Magnetic objects that is a consumer product intended marketed or commonly used as a manipulative or construction item for entertainment Such as puzzle-working sculpture building mental stimulation or stress relief and that's the current proposal for the draft final rule They the definition of an individual magnet was also added to the rule and the definition is Let me read that quote an individual magnetic object intended or marketed for use with or as a magnet set as defined in paragraph b Of the defined rule. So individual magnet is now defined We also modified the definition of magnet set from the NPR's wording to remove the word permanent It was felt that that wasn't needed in the definition and we replaced a phrase intended or marketed by the manufacturer primarily With the phrase intended marketed or commonly used and that was felt that that would prevent people from Labeling their product out of the scope of the rule and not needing to comply with it by just slapping a label on it We replaced the phrase desk toy with the word item It was felt that desk toy never really properly captured the product category as a whole and the word item is more general and The scope now specifies factors that could indicate whether a magnet set meets The definition and these were were added to help manufacturers and retailers understand when their products fall in the scope and I have a slide to unpack that those factors Basically these factors come from well established Regulations specifically the small parts regulation. It's it's not an exact quote from that rule But it mimics it very closely So the office of compliance will take into account manufacturers stated intent if it's a reasonable one Advertising promotion marketing packaging and or display of the product and the uses for which the product is commonly Recognized by consumers and this language is is similar to our small parts rule The requirements for the final rule are simply stated and and this is an exact quote Each magnet in a magnet set and any individual magnet that fits completely within the cylinders described in 16 CFR 1501.4 Which is our small part cylinder Must have a flex flux index of 50 kilo gals squared millimeter squared or less when tested in accordance with the method described in section 1240.4 So the flux index was developed as I mentioned by the ASTM if 963 toy standard and that's the the the test That's mentioned here described in 1240.4 it replicates the toy standards method Staff is required to consider alternatives to rulemaking and here's a list of the different Alternatives that were considered and are described in detail in the tabs of of your briefing package Different performance requirements were considered safe for packaging warnings and labels restrictions on sales and corrective actions And of course the option to do nothing in the final regulatory analysis We need to explain that the baseline for the benefit cost measurement is perhaps slightly different than the normal course of events the Benefits and costs are estimated relative to the state of the market prior to compliance enforcement actions The reason this was done was because there was a severe drop-off in the sales when the compliance activities began The choice of the baseline assumes that without the rule the market could revert to prior status due to consumer demand and Ease of market entry. It's very easy for someone to repackage bulk magnets and sell them as a magnet set The benefits of the rule Come from the injury cost model and this is the usual economic analysis They're measured as a reduction in societal costs of injuries attributed to the rule such as medical costs Work loss estimates and intangible costs of pain and suffering and there's no deviation from the usual course of economic analysis The annual benefits for this rule have been estimated to be about 29 million dollars relative to the baseline The costs of the rule Are measured as lost producer surplus and lost consumer utility There is as much as six million dollars in lost producer surplus But the value of lost utility cannot be measured using available data. So it's unknown We're required to consider the regulatory flexibility analysis impacts on small business and businesses So since the publication of our NPR and the compliance actions began 12 Importers stopped selling magnet sets and sales of the magnet sets have dropped dramatically one major firm note that it's a major firm still sells magnets and They sell only magnet sets. No other products that we know of The final rule will likely have a significant adverse impact on the one remaining major firm But I should note here that several Smaller firms still remain and that seems very easy to enter this market, especially using online retailing Established sellers can easily purchase magnetic spheres and package them as a magnet set as defined And the Office of Compliance has witnessed smaller firms coming into and going out of the market pretty easily So allow me to summarize then we have a vulnerable population experiencing high severity injuries That are hard to diagnose and treat The hazard is not intuitive not well known Easily misdiagnosed and there therefore constitutes a hidden hazard The injury mechanism is complex and not intuitive and does not lend itself to Prevention strategies that rely on warning labels note. I'm not saying that warnings in general are ineffective I'm saying warnings are ineffective in this case for this product category The draft rule has an extremely limited scope That should minimize the risks associated with magnet sets as defined and should not affect magnets used for other purposes so That also has Done the requisite cost-benefit analysis and found that the benefits to society are likely to be greater than the costs So bearing all those facts in mind Staff recommends a rule based on the performance requirements of the toy standard that address magnet related injuries an effective Date 180 days after publication in the federal register So that concludes my presentation. We're certainly open for questions Thank You dr. Midget. Thank You mr. Camaros We're now going to move to the phase of the briefing where the commissioners can ask questions Each commissioner will be entitled to ten minutes and we'll have as many rounds as necessary as Questions are needed to be asked. I'm going to go ahead and start and dr. Midget You obviously talked at the beginning and then again at the end about the Injuries associated with the hazard From a lay person's perspective if you can start from the beginning Whether you're talking about a young child or a teenager One what are they feeling internally to how do these symptoms present to a caregiver and then to Assuming they get medical attention as you would hope they would to a medical provider What's actually happening in lay terms inside the body and then once there is medical intervention What kind of intervention is there and then long-term what's actually going to be going on with that person's body and the type Of care that they're going to continue to need and of course if you need to ask anybody else on staff to assist you with You at the table, please go ahead I think that's an interesting question because you're getting into The what's happening in the family home and how children are coming into contact with these products We know from injury reports that sometimes these products are are Purchased for the victim and given to them by their caregivers Sometimes the children come into contact with them at school or through their friends who hand out Parts of their own set to their friends to play with because if you have 216 you're not going to miss a Few a handful here or there So there are a significant number of families coming into contact with these products They never bought them. They never saw the packaging. They didn't even know what they were the children just end up having them And these products being magnetic can behave in very unpredictable ways, especially for children who don't have a great deal of experience using these things they end up stuck to belt buckles and and Backpacks and they find their way all throughout the house because they're magnetic. They hitch a ride So they could end up anywhere And this containment issue is very difficult for parents to stay on top of if not impossible even people who are trying to keep all of their Magnets set together as one coherent unit are losing magnets We know that because there's manufacturers who are selling them singly as replacements So they're they're losing track of these products. So where are they gonna end up? They end up all over the house in the carpet in the rugs And that's where children are spending lots of time playing and then when they come across them they look sometimes like candy and There are candies out there that are suspiciously similar to magnet sets And but even if they didn't look like candy even if they look nothing like candy Children of those young ages put everything in their mouth and the likelihood of swallowing them is quite high once they get a hold of them So the caregivers are are facing an uphill battle to monitor the existence of these things in their home and to monitor They're whereabouts at all times. It's very difficult to supervise that kind of a hazard As far as what happens if a child ingests them, I think maybe the easiest thing to do would be to Read an account from the NPR which had Accounts of many different incidents from our in-depth investigations and I will choose the one Which I think is well, maybe I can read to here Here's one where a ten-year-old girl was simulating a tongue piercing She accidentally swallowed two small magnetic balls the same day Her mother took her to the local emergency room and she was admitted for five days during which time the movement of the magnets was monitored by 10 x-rays three CT scans and an endoscopy So five days of hospitalization Ultimately the magnets were manipulated from their eventual position in the colon Into the appendix via laparoscopic surgery and then removed by an appendectomy. There's no indication that She she had a perforation and reportedly the total medical costs incurred during the child's the girl's treatment exceeded $22,000 Let me select another one that was a famous case a 23-month-old male Ingested eight small spherical magnets from a product described as a magnetic puzzle He started vomiting overnight and worse in the next day as a result He was taken to an urgent care facility where a bilateral ear infection initially was suspected These sometimes looks like something very different an ear infection a few hours later as the child's condition worsened And he lost consciousness intermittently an abdominal x-ray indicated six small balls that his mother recognized immediately and Informed the staff were magnets from the puzzle He was transferred to a children's hospital where subsequent x-ray revealed some slight movement and according to the mother The doctors thought the magnets would pass naturally an x-ray taken the following day showed the magnets were located between the small and large Intestine therefore surgery was undertaken to remove them during surgery Two small two balls were found in the small intestine and six were found outside the bowel in the abdominal cavity These were removed and a small intestine intestinal perforation was repaired The child underwent several sequential surgeries over that the next 10 days to repair leaks It's unclear if this involved misperforations or failure of repairs or new perforations They treated a blood clot ischemic necrotic bowel, which is essentially dead tissue that lost blood flow and Serious infection stemming from the initial magnetic injury ultimately after what appears to be at least five or six operations The child was stabilized and was still in intensive care unit for more than a month having lost all but ten to fifteen centimeters of his small intestine But he lost all but ten to fifteen centimeters of his small intestine The small intestine is usually about six hundred to seven hundred centimeters long according to HS staff The boy is being fed intravenously and has a colostomy bag to remove waste products He will require a bowel transplant and his long-term prognosis is poor Staff notes. This is HF staff staff notes that this case recently has been reported in the medical literature and Also reported on a podcast at the website of the North American Society for Pediatric and gastroenterology hepatology and nutrition So this is a famous case where a child basically lost The vast majority of his intestines, so he's still Undoubtedly going to undergo treatment and this this injury is going to affect him for his entire life I could go on there are more interesting cases from a physiological standpoint, but basically These are terrible injuries and I'll leave it at that And dr. Midget in in your estimation. What is distinguishing about? This product or these products that end up with that kind of medical result as opposed to something and is similarly sized or shaped That is swallowed by a child that a medical professional might actually recommend waiting for that to pass. Well, it's the the magnetic Attraction force if if a magnet is on one side of One curve of the intestines and on the other side they can attract together over several centimeters Even if they were lying on the desk here, they they have such strong forces So once they're in proximity in the intestines, they clamp together People don't think of that It's hard to foresee that injury mechanism. So if your child swallows a magnet, you might not think anything of it And if they swallowed another one, you might not think anything of it Because you don't picture Magnets being able to attract through parts of the body, but once they're affixed They're most likely going to stay there until they pull through because it's such a powerful Attraction our final rule limits the flux index to 50, but these products have many times higher the magnetic strength They're in the hundreds of flux Thank You dr. Midget commissioner Anna Thank You mr. Chairman and thank you for an excellent presentation. I really appreciate it Before I ask any questions. I did want to respond to my colleague commissioner Burkle's absence at the meeting She is an extremely thoughtful and Reasonable person in the fact that she's not appeared shows that she has some serious concerns So I will say for myself. I miss her wisdom. I miss her good cheer But I don't want to let her comments go unaddressed because I disagree with them So I'm going to make some general comments not necessarily related to the specifics of the magnet vote because I don't have the Magnet case before me yet It is correct to note that the Commission is about to vote on a consumer product safety standard That's what we're doing today at the same time the Commission has an administrative proceeding before administrative law judge specifically with respect to the same product and in my view that is Completely appropriate consistent with our statute and with current administrative practice throughout the government the two proceedings involve Different purposes different law and different issues. So again speaking generally Go back to the day when the Congress passed the Consumer Product Safety Act They wanted us to be able to address dangerous products in comprehensive fashion So first they said we want you to be able to write safety rules and safety standards But they put a provision in its section 9g1 of the Consumer Product Safety Act And it says when you write a safety standard, you can't touch products that are already in the marketplace And the theory seems to be it's not fair to Address products in a safety standard that when they were produced the safety standard wasn't in effect And so they were perfectly legal But Congress didn't want us to leave to leave us without the ability to go after products in the marketplace if they're particularly Dangerous, so they set up a different procedure in section 12 and section 15 In which they said if you encounter a product that is particularly dangerous We apply a different standard, but we will authorize you to go against those products so they've allowed us to go after products With respect to the future and with a different set of issues different law They've given us the authority to go after products that are currently in the marketplace, but if you look at section 15 it says you it's not enough to prove that a product violates a consumer product safety standard That won't get you relief under section 15 You actually have to prove that the violation of the safety standard presents a substantial product hazard So it's a different and it's a more stringent Standard for us to meet and that's what's being litigated Or the the likelihood of it being a defect because again, we don't have a safety standard into effect I'm not passing judgment on the administrative proceeding But my point is that there is no due process violation and no Impropriety in the two proceedings Anybody who's involved in the development of the safety standard has the full ability to submit written comments to participate in an oral proceeding and to Bring a challenge to the safety standard in court if they wish Similarly a party that's facing administrative litigation has the full range of due process rights granted under section 554 of the Administrative Procedure Act and section 15 f1 of the Consumer Product Safety Act Meaning they have the full panoply of rights that any respondent would have and the right to challenge that case in court And that's similar to the authority at most agencies And I don't know of a single case that has found those two Procedures to be inappropriate or illegal and there have been a number of challenges But she does raise an issue that I have to admit I've always been perplexed by and that is I Remember when I first came to the Commission and the general counsel explained to us how administrative cases are handled First they come to the commissioners and they say we want you to make a preliminary Determination that this product might present a substantial product hazard. Let us go and bring Administrative proceeding then after the administrative proceeding guess who here's the appeal we do and so that's always struck me as a bit Anomalous, but that is something if ever there were an issue that's been litigated to the Supreme Court in which the Supreme Court has said As with most other agencies, that's the way the administrative procedure Operates with respect to administrative litigation It still feels a little bit strange to me and the way I've coped with it is Once we have cast a vote to initiate a case. I don't follow it at all. I don't read newspaper stories about it I don't read the pleadings even if they're public. I want that to be at least in my case a mental firewall between our initiation of the case and when the case comes to us and I think that That permits us to provide a full and fair and pristine Procedure for people. I mentioned that just because I see that that seems to commit Concerned Commissioner Burkle. It's not an unreasonable concern, but I think it's a concern that long ago has been laid to rest So with that I'd like to ask a question of Dr. Midget if I might And I note that we set a flux index of 50 and we've gotten that from ASTM And I guess my question and this is just my sort of Fly specking what we've done. I wonder if we ever Decided at some point just to get some animal tissue Take two magnets that have a flux of 50 and see if they tracked each other through the tissue In other words, we're looking at the empirical data, which is a perfectly reasonable thing to do But it does make me nervous that At least as I understand it nobody's ever sat down taken two magnets with the flux of 50 and seen what the effect is on animal tissue Or maybe we've done that do you happen to know if we've ever done anything like that? Well, I don't know that we ever used animal tissue But we did consider the lower bound limit when ASTM was developing the flux index to use in the toy standard And we fully admit and we're on the record saying to them that it is possible For a magnet with a flux index of 50 to potentially attract across tissues But the the magnetic field of a of a flux Index of 50 magnet is very small So the magnets have to get much closer together than they do in the regular magnet sets And to be able to tell just that they will attach isn't enough to answer the question Then you need to know could the normal contractions of the intestine pull them apart again It might it may be that they will attract and find each other in the intestines, but then the course of normal anatomical motions Well, we'll open well, we'll pull them apart again, and they'll keep going through So to do that kind of study really would require a live intestine, so you'd have to do You know you couldn't you couldn't do human subject testing you'd probably have to go to animal testing live sheep And we actually looked into how much it would cost to do live animal testing with sheep or pigs or something like that And it's a very expensive study. So I gather and by the way, I hereby Refused to volunteer to help you in a study like that, but thank you for putting that in context That certainly helps and I'm not saying that the establishment of 50 flux Is inappropriate or unreasonable. It's just one that I was curious about the degree of certainty. We have about that I did also want to ask a mr. Camaros I noticed that we don't in the standard have any certification requirements with respect to a general conformity certificate, but it is our position that anybody that might be making a Magnet set where they say it's it would meet our standard. They would be obligated to certify that That that has passed a reasonable testing program. I am I correct in saying that I believe that's correct And the only reason I raise it is that at least historically when we wrote safety standards We put provisions in the safety standard relating to certification out may have been that since the consumer product safety improvement act mandated HCCs that we don't have to put it in and so maybe that is the That's the reason it's not there, but I just noticed it wasn't there I also noticed something else. It wasn't there and that is in other standards We've put in what I would term as anti-stockpiling provisions, which says if you're a manufacturer You can't suddenly produce gobs and gobs of stuff for inventory that you would then sell and which would be legal and Therefore would potentially flood the market at least for a period of time Is there a particular reason that we didn't do stockpiling language in this safety standard? I think I know the answer, but I'd be curious what your thought was To be honest, I don't I don't recall ever actually considering that In the course of the work that was done in in drafting the the regulatory text Well, my guess was that we looked at what was actually taking place in the market We said there's there's not enough production there so that stockpiling would present a hazard and maybe it's more of an academic Concern, but I I just wondered why we didn't have any language in there for stockpiling I think I will stop my questions at this point and I thank you. I do have a few future questions Commissioner Robinson. Thank you, Mr. Chair I also would like to start by just commenting on Commissioner Burkle's decision not to participate today and say how disappointed I am in that After I received her email yesterday saying she was not going to participate I also reviewed our statute carefully and our vote our decision to vote on the notice of proposed rulemaking and our final rulemaking Package and I won't reiterate what Commissioner Adler so ably Explained as to why this is a perfectly appropriate proceeding. I just would like to add that I think that her decision not to participate Is a is a troubling precedent Because I think if we communicate to the regulated community that all it takes is litigation To make us halt rulemaking no matter how dangerous a product might be that we're sending a troubling message And on a more pleasant note I would like to just take a moment to introduce a new member of my staff Bo as a green who's sitting right behind me Mr. Green is coming to us from the commodity futures trading Commission Where he was a trial attorney for four years and before that he was an associate at Dewey LeBuff for five years and That's after graduating from NYU summa cum laude and Georgetown University Law Center cum laude in 2005 And I also just have to add that in a previous life. He was a commander in the Israeli Defense Forces for tank commanders So He's going to take care of us Welcome Bo as And I would just like to thank not only mr. Carneros and dr. Midgett for your wonderful presentation But this package was really incredibly well prepared and there were obviously so many parts of our agency that came together to put This package together and I really want to thank all of you I Think my first question is a quick one And I don't know if either of you want to answer it or if you want to ask somebody from compliance But you did mention dr. Midgett about the fact that that the numbers have fallen Somewhat since our compliance actions and we've had two recent settlements We know of and I guess I would like to know if What compliance is or or your opinion is? With respect to whether this has our compliance actions have had enough of an effect that there's rulemaking Procedure it may not be necessary Actually when we practiced for this presentation that came up and the office of compliance personnel did mention to me to make you aware of the fact that it's easy to enter this market and So the office of compliance is not comfortable Saying that we've done enough because anybody can start selling these pretty easily So they see small firms joining in all the time So this rule still very much is needed And I would just like to add that everyone in my office was very upset when we went online and tried to purchase them To see how easily you could get around this. So I applaud you for going forward with this rulemaking procedure I think what I'd like to just zoom in on for a moment is with respect to the Numbers that went into the cost-benefit analysis. And again, you may I know we have our person here from Epidemiology who actually went behind the numbers from our nice hospitals and just for anyone who doesn't know That's a roughly a hundred emergency rooms from which we gather our statistical data And my understanding of how we came up with the final number that somewhere around 28 million is we started with that nice data Went behind it in epidemiology Determined what of magnet swallowing's? Were most likely had a high probability of being these high-powered magnets And then we took that number and fed it into our injury cost model. Am I understanding that correctly? I Believe that's an adequate summary. Okay, so what I'd like to do is just for a just for a second I'm not quite ready for econ But I'd just like to ask a couple questions with respect to what went into the process of coming up with that estimate of 2,900 for the nice numbers and I Know that the the the information was looked at with respect to the narratives And these narratives are the actual medical records as I understand it That describe what someone's treatment is in an emergency department. Obviously focusing on the medical treatment With some mentions from time to time of the cause. Is that fair to say? That's correct, and it's not just Medical records, but we get nice reports specifically and with very specific limited information And then with respect to looking at that information What words were used to I understand that there were different categories of these magnet? that magnets that were involved in the injuries that resulted in something coming into the emergency department and I think there were different descriptions, but I just like to know which words caused which Of the treatments to go into which category Okay, that's a very specific question it is Addressed in the epidemiology tab of the briefing package, but I would probably best defer to Sarah Garland Who perform the analysis to describe those key words? Okay, so the different categories the yes possible group was So in the nice narrative occasionally we get a we hit a Great part where they they've reported to us the manufacturer model Of a product that there's no requirement to do that, but they occasionally it does happen So we can identify those exactly on what product was involved But since that's not the normal then going off of other key words To create the yes possible category basically if the manufacturer was identified. Okay, great. It's yes, but For all the rest they were possible that so if they described it as a magnetic ball or a bead Or a bb-sized magnet or something so along those lines I think that's don't know if that's the exhaustive list But basically they had to give us some indication in that nice narrative that this thing was At least something in the or a very the other one was a very magnetic or very strong magnet That and so they could be classified into the possible It had to give some indication the magnet wasn't just Any old magnet out there that just giving us some indication that it might be coming from one of these magnets And they got into the possible group that if it didn't give us any of those indication then it went into An unknown group if we had no way of telling what was happening What kind of magnet was in there if it described it as a kitchen magnet or an alphabet magnet We knew absolutely that it was not something that we were interested in for categorizing here Those were removed from the analysis altogether And then there were some other types of magnets that might be this type but not in a magnet set so they were classified as other and So those are so we have the group unknown which is the majority of what's in there That most time they're just described as an unknown magnet Or they're just described as a magnet so we just don't know what type they are and So they got those get classified into the unknown or other group Okay, so could you just tell us what exactly was required for a For an injury to be put into the category of yes, probably high-powered magnets that identified manufacturer that we were aware of that manufacturers got the manufacturer and then it had to say Let's see. Let's make sure I get the whole list We have high-powered Magnetic ball a marble a bb-sized magnet or magnetic bead if they don't mention that it's jewelry If it was mentioned as jewelry then a classified as other, but if it was magnetic bead without The jewelry context then it was classified as possible possible So which of those that you've just described ended up in the estimate of the 2,900 as opposed to the 7,700 So any of those that were were classified as those were are in the 2,900 so anything that described the One had to have a manufacturer or high-powered magnet Or a ball or a magnetic ball or a magnetic bead or bb-sized magnet description And anything else would go into that 7,700 because we weren't sure of it. Okay. That's helpful. Thank you so much and I have two minutes left so maybe I can ask a real quick question of Econ And maybe you can answer this doctor midget or mr. Carneros as well But I just wanted when when this 2,900 number now was then fed into my understanding is that was fed into our injury cost Model that has algorithms for certain categories of injuries. Do I understand that correctly? Okay, and the the Category of injury that we would use for this cost analysis as I understand it was any Foreign object that swallowed Yeah, our Estimates of injury costs are not product specific. They're Diagnosis body part specific so our estimate of what the cost would be for a particular injury say a foreign Object in ingestion, which is what this would what most of the magnet injuries are coded as would be based on The types of injuries that are found in the database So magnets themselves would probably account for only a small proportion of the Foreign object ingestions. Okay, so this would also include objects that end up passing through. Yeah, it could be batteries Balloons coins anything that would be a kid might swallow Yeah, anything yeah and anything that the hospital would code is okay just for an object And you you only use the numbers from the nice data the 2,900 for your estimate. Is that correct? Well, we use I mean as opposed to the as opposed to the anecdotal information Yes, but I mean we use more than just the nice estimates. We also Augmented the nice data by the estimate our estimate of injuries treated outside of emergency rooms, right? And that's part of the algorithm. That's part of the injury cost model So in other words and as I understand it for example the 100 cases that are discussed in the briefing materials that were not part of of the Statistical data is not something we plug into our algorithm. Is that right? If if epidemiology did not count it as a likely Rare earth magnet injury wouldn't have included it. That's very helpful. Thank you so much I'm my time's up. Thank you. Mr. Chair mission more of it Thank You mr. Chairman mr. Chairman the The impact of this moment is not missed on me as I'm sure it's not missed on you Being our first hearing so first of all I'd like to say Congratulations to you on your leadership of the CPSC. I think you're off to a fantastic start I would like to also thank my fellow commissioners for really making me Very welcome as well as their staff and the entire Staff and safety community for helping me get my feet underneath me. So I hope you don't mind that small point of personal privilege I think it's also can't be said enough the dead of gratitude the entire Safety community has to offer to former chairman Tenenbaum and for her stewardship through perhaps one of the most important periods of this agency's history the CPSIA Implementation I often look at this period In time right now and your new leadership as the post CPSIA Implementation so a new man for new times a new leadership and I look forward to working with you moving forward That brings us to the subject of the hearing today I must say as an overview the In particular the latency the severity of this particular product hazard has been one that's always had significant Impact and will continue to be particular cause for alarm for me Dr. Midgett, mr. Cameron, so I want to thank you for a very effective overview and and briefing as well as the entire staff who Contributed to the accompanying documents and the staff briefing package. It's an excellent work I do have some technical questions that I'd like to get into First of all with regards to the cost-benefit analysis work that was performed I think some critics will look at government cost-benefit analysis and and think that either the Costs are overstated or understated and the benefits might be overstated or understated based on one's particular Position and how they view the rule so I do think it's important to give it a thorough review I have done that as well and I have some questions and I'll if you will I'll start on the benefit side and looking at the Benefits that are indicated in the package What gives me a little bit of pause is the consideration of 100% mitigation? By virtue of the potential impact of this rule and I think 100% is always a tough number to achieve No matter what the chore is Could you mention in particular the not how we got to the 29 million in estimated Potential benefits but with regards to the potential mitigation and how We come to the conclusion that 100% of the of the related Injuries and and how that number is forged and will be achieved Most rules that we develop at CPSC Result in kind of modest safety improvements of products typical examples are our section 104 nursery product rules and We take a product that exists would make a few modifications to it to make it more safe and then it meets the standard and Presumably the injury rate is going to go down But since the product's still there you're still going to have injuries with the product So you're going to have much less than 100% effectiveness of a change in the standard The magnet rule is different in the sense that we're eliminating These magnet sets from the marketplace So by definition to the extent that the rule is effective all of the injuries involving these magnet sets Would be prevented and that's basically the difference Good point. I do agree that and I understand the scope and the potential impact of the rule However, the performance requirement being a flux indication does not necessarily eliminate small magnets it may Eliminate small high powered magnets as defined by the performance standard but getting to some of the other comments of my colleagues on the commission here and looking at the the performance of the the flux standard in particular and and I don't question Lending from the toy standard to look in that direction But potentially what we could still have out in the market is a small magnet That that does perform to the standard and therefore is of a lower value But the also the assumption in the report is that that would not result in any related injuries. Well, of course we we always have these magnets under the toy standard and So injuries involving magnets that satisfy the toy standard may still exist and they may continue But we're presuming in the analysis that we did that epidemiology gave to us Just magnet injuries resulting from these rare earth strong very strong magnets But of course if other magnets are in use and children swallow them And they go to the hospital. There will be some injuries, but not from the magnets that we're trying to address in the standard understood and If you could humor me a bit on the cost side Associated as well Did I read correctly in the briefing package that there was an original estimation on the cost side? That was above six million the number that is in my head might be seven point five on a previous draft Is that correct? In the NPR we used slightly different sales estimates. We used Better estimates in this analysis in the earlier analysis we had assumed sales were on the order of about a million a year But we've kind of refined the data a little bit since the NPR and it's more like about 800,000 a year and that's and that was that was really why the the difference between the NPR and the Final rule analysis excellent. Thank you. I Have some other questions with regards to the use of Lending of taking the ASTM standard From my previous position I Was under the impression that the ASTM working group on magnets was considering potentially a different Value for the performance standard Do we recognize that that's still a case and and is it of a high likelihood that? The particular performance standard that we are lending from might in fact No longer be the case with the with the toy standard. I'm not aware of that work or that suggestion Not not never run across it Very well, and we're sure that any any of our staff that are that are contributing to that working group It it they don't have any reason to believe that that performance standard is under Revaluation for a potentially better standard whatever that may be. I'm not I'm not sure but that's something that was In my mind. We're not aware of any work in that. I'll have to get back to you I'll pull the staff and find out if anybody is aware of that activity. Okay Because one of the things that does concern me about the potential rule is if in fact we are We're leveraging the performance standard in the toy in the toy arena and then that effect that rule does change that perhaps the efficacy of using that performance standard may become in question and I don't know if the staff had considered any Flexibility language akin to what's involved in some of the 963 languages that allow for some changes in 963 with regards to how the agency relies upon it as a mandatory rule has Considered alone or is there just total and complete confidence in that performance standard? Being the performance standard to completely and as we state 100% mitigate any related Injuries or deaths caused by these particular by the by the products under the scope of the rule Certainly staff's opinion is that the toy standard is the most expedient way to get the vast majority of these injuries that are occurring We're comfortable relying on the precedent set by the toy standard at this time given new information We could reevaluate And I would note that in the briefing package our engineering sciences group sampled and and tested and measured the flux index of virtually all Magnet sets in the in the market at one time and I believe The very weakest magnets that they came across were in the two maybe 200 flux range all the way up to multiples of that and They were fairly confident in concluding that there are no magnets that would Be considered magnets sets that are anything close to that 50 flux Limit that's placed in that that appears in the the draft final rule Thank you very much. I have no further questions Thank You commissioner morovic, and thank you for your kind words as well as the comments about Former chairman ten about my feeling I'm going to be getting a call from a South Carolina area code wondering why I didn't say anything During your presentation dr. Midgett you talked about how Post the issuance of the notice of proposed rulemaking the numbers have continued the incident reports have continued And then in response to commissioner robinson's question you talked about the office of compliance believing that actions taken to date We're not sufficient going forward Could you explain a little bit more please about what the state of play with the reporting of incidents has been since the notice of Proposed rulemaking and what your thoughts are on what that means going forward and the Necessity or lack thereof of this proposed rule Given the data that we have it's difficult to Accertain rates of injury in the US population. We have numbers coming in so the number of injuries Continues to grow since we instituted since we proposed the rule back in 2012 We've continued to receive injuries Injury reports and as those numbers grow so does my concern that we really need to do something and Since it's so easy for manufacturers to Buy bulk magnets and repackage them The compliance activities so far have been a good start, but they're only just a start We won't won't really be able to rest easily Until there's a rule in place covering this product category. That's my opinion And historically with injury reporting patterns, how many years out does it take for staff to get a confidence? To become confident that enough years have passed for those numbers for prior years will remain static Yeah, I'm not I'm not aware of any Set number that we are comfortable that we've we've gathered all the information that there is to gather as I understand that we get Data points coming in from several years ago Regularly so that previous analyses are often Modified by new information that arrives at any given time. For instance, we purchase Corners reports medical examiner reports from the states and sometimes those don't come in until years later So our numbers for 2009 could still increase even in 2014 Okay, thank you commissioner. I'm Thank you very much And I did want to also extend thanks to our colleague mr. Harovick for being a man of good cheer and wisdom and it's a delight to work with you And I look forward to doing that in future years I wanted to ask about magnetized jewelry I ran across an article yesterday when I was preparing for the meeting today in which I think it was in 2007 the commission had actually issued a warning about magnetized jewelry being used as Faux tongue piercing nose piercing mouth piercing and we were getting some incidents which I gather were dwarfed In the next year or so when buckyballs and other magnet sets were sold and I also noticed that in the Injury data we have a very small number, but a persistent number of jewelry ingestions Am I correct in saying that somebody who's actually marketing? Magnetized jewelry as magnetized jewelry, but marketing it as fake tongue piercing mouth piercing nose piercing would not be covered by this rule Am I correct in saying that? That's correct And I also noted in I think it was a midget memo that Australia actually has extended their Regulation of magnets. I think it's if it's been Marketed or promoted as jewelry to be worn in or around the mouth or nose As covered by their regulation and I was curious Is it just that the number of jewelry incidents that we know about are so small that we decided not to include them in the rule? Is it your sense that? Jewelry the magnetized jewelry will just not present the serious enough hazard in the future to be covered by this standard It's a valid question jewelry has Standards voluntary standards already in place covering that product category and when we framed the notice of proposed rulemaking our main concern was to get at the definitive cause of these injuries and While it would have been possibly a good idea to include other product categories It would have slowed down the analysis and the discussion and perhaps not really have been required if the voluntary standard is effective in that product category We chose the path of expediency. We want to get something in place to cover what we know is hurting kids right now Well, my middle name is expediency So I fully endorse that as an approach, but I do hope and I'm quite certain that you will be monitoring the marketplace to see That when these high-powered magnet sets are off the market that kids who want to Have these faux tongue piercings don't turn to The kinds of magnetized jewelry that might present a hazard and I hope the voluntary standard addresses that I'm certainly with you on that I Also had one other question that it's just sort of puzzled me and I'm not sure Can even Yeah, if you were to look at the injury estimates on page 71 and I apologize I should have just called you up and asked you this but I got you on the hot seat So I'm gonna ask you now it's on page 71 and it says Just over half of the magnet cases from the emergency departments of the hospitals That comprise the nice sample appear to involve the ingestion of more than one Magnet and I found that puzzling were we getting a number of reports? from nice hospitals of ingestions of magnets that were just an ingestion of one magnet I'll defer to Sarah Garland answer that question and were those like refrigerator magnets or big magnets that Might be a choking hazard or a digestion hazard, but not a magnetic hazard we have for the for the NPR analysis that looked at the wording that was in the nice narrative to see how many magnets might have been swallowed and so that in that analysis that We have I didn't make intend to make this a pop quiz that for For that one this yes We had the majority of them were in the one magnet category that where they just described it as swallowed a magnet or swallowed one Magnet whereas we had other ones where they said yeah, but they swallowed two or seven or are just magnets And so they were placed in more than one magnet category, okay? That's I found that very interesting and maybe it leads nowhere and I guess that those are my questions for the moment again. Thank you Commissioner Robinson Mr. Chair, I would just like to preface this next question with some Testimony that's part of the public record from the hearing back in October When the pediatric gastroenterologist came in to testify before us and Dr. Ian Liebowitz who was director of pediatric digestive disease center at a Nova Fairfax Hospital Testified that more than a hundred thousand foreign body ingestions occur each year mostly in children 10 to 20 percent of non high-powered magnet ingestions require endoscopic removal less than 1% require surgical intervention, however with high-powered magnet ingestions 80% of them need intervention and 20% need significant surgery And so I guess I'd just like to follow up Dr. Midgett with Commissioner moharovic's questions about these flux index and I think you mentioned Mr. Camaros that the Camaros that the the Flux index for the ones that we're concerned with are over 200 my understanding is some of them are as high as 400 So I guess Following up on that on that preface. I could you explain to us how swallowing a Magnet that's 50 versus and the injury that might occur or not occur versus the injuries with these high-powered magnets differ a lower flux index magnet is Most likely going to be a smaller magnet and it's most likely going to have a smaller Reach of attraction so the magnetic field if you can picture it emanating from the magnet itself won't be as big With a 50 flux index magnet as it would be with a 200 flux index magnet a 200 or 300 flux index magnet can Find another magnet over several centimeters So those really weak magnets in order to attract together to one another have to be much closer together and in space and so Then once they are attracted together It takes less force to pull them apart when the 200 or 400 flux magnets get together You have to yank them apart once they're affixed. They're not coming undone in the intestines And in terms of the of the long-term injuries that can result I happen frankly to be very familiar with theirs having tried a case for someone who suffered from Short-gut syndrome after a majority of the valve being removed and this so I'm very familiar with it But I just like you to explain how these injuries that can result from these magnets the high-powered magnets are different Than the ones with the lower flux index But I'm extrapolating but I believe the higher flux index is going to create an injury faster because it's going to press Testons tighter and they'll they're also larger. So you might have a larger footprint for injury to occur Then then with a much weaker magnet and when we talk about injury, we're talking about cutting off blood flow to the intestine That's right, which can lead to a bald up. That's right. So the blood flow once it's cut off the The tissue dies and then that can lead to a perforation. Thank you. I have nothing further Which we're more of it. Thank you, mr. Chairman and Forgive me for giving me Greg. There's a couple other questions. I had with regard to the cost-benefit analysis I didn't think I'd have time for in my previous set of questions I wanted to get to the overall determination of the total cost and as the packet package demonstrates that the total cost is the combination of loss producer surplus along with lost use value And I think the package does demonstrate that We we have tried but have failed to be able to put anything in terms of a monetary estimate behind the the lost use value and my concern is that while this is One of the requirements in terms of our section 9 rulemaking as stated earlier to ensure that the cost bear a reasonable relationship to the benefits that If our cost-benefit analysis comes into question, then one might be able to question the validity of the rule itself Would you mind for anybody for myself and for anybody else interested in in this particular aspect of the rulemaking? to extrapolate a bit on the determination of Lost utility and while With every great effort it wasn't something that we were able to determine for this package Yeah When an economist talks about use value or utility What they're usually referring to is how much a consumer is willing and able to pay for a product That is kind of our definition of what what value means and That value can for discussion purposes be broken into a couple different components one is what the consumer actually pays for the product and so in the case of magnets the Average price was about twenty five dollars So a consumer pays the market, you know a consumer no matter how badly they want the magnets they're going to pay the market price and so they'll pay twenty five dollars for a set and That's in a sense kind of a You can say then that at a very minimum they're placing a value of about twenty five dollars on this magnet set but in addition to that We also know that Consumers are usually willing to pay more than they actually did pay and you may think back to your Introductory economics course and we had downward sloping supply demand curves Meaning that as the price declines the quantity demanded rises well In a market everybody plays that market price the twenty five dollars But everybody who buys the magnet set at twenty five Probably would have been willing to pay a higher amount. Some might have been willing to pay twenty six dollars Some might have been willing to pay thirty five Some might have been willing to pay fifty dollars But we don't know what that number is and that's we call that consumer surplus and so if for example a Magnet set cost twenty five dollars, but we know that this individual consumer would have been willing to pay thirty five dollars for it Then we would say the value to that consumer is about thirty five dollars for the set Now if you're going to take the product away from the consumer so they can't buy it anymore which we do with this rule They're going to have the twenty five dollars that they couldn't spend on the magnet set So what they're really going to lose is what we call that consumer surplus that amount over and above What they actually had to pay for it? I mean that consumer surplus represents kind of a benefit that a consumer doesn't actually have to pay for That's going to be the real loss With this type of rule now unfortunately, I mean if we knew the shape of the demand curve We'd be able to calculate what that number is, but we really don't know the shape And that's why that's why we can't calculate what the actual consumer loss would be now I you can you can come up with some examples. I mean you could in the Regulatory analysis we said as an example if On average all consumers who bought the magnets for twenty five dollars had been willing to pay thirty five dollars Then the aggregate consumer surplus would be the ten extra dollars time sales Which was about eight hundred thousand or about eight million dollars So if you believe that on average someone's going to get $10 of additional utility out of the product than what they had to pay for it Then you could calculate an estimate of the consumer surplus Unfortunately, we have no basis for that. We don't know whether The average increase that consumers would pay would be five dollars ten dollars or fifteen dollars So we know it's not zero. We know it's greater than zero But we really can't quantify it and so all we can really do is is is discuss it And we did that the best we could I Appreciate that and thank you have we looked at other examples where other rule makings have required the same but yet There's been that same difficulty in being able to come up with a good Estimation of the lost use use value well ordinarily this kind of this lost Consumer utility is not an important aspect of the regulatory analysis When we're looking at a more normal rule that just changes the product a little bit to make it a little bit more safe safer and increases its price But the product is still available to consumers then we'd look at costs as you know, we'd say well The cost increase was five dollars to make it safer and we'd multiply that five dollars times the number of products And that would be our estimate of What the cost of the rule would be in this case since we're eliminating the product from the marketplace That it doesn't work. I mean we can't look at it that way So we have to we have to change our point of view to think about what the loss in consumer utility is and what the loss in Producer surpluses and producer surpluses essentially just profits you can think of it that way But we ordinarily don't go into an analysis of losses in consumer surplus or producer surplus Partly because the increases in price are usually relatively minor and so you aren't going to have much of an impact on consumer surplus So does that answer kind of your question? It does very much I mean especially the point that you mentioned how this rulemaking in particular is a bit different with some traditional Approaches for other rule makings whether CPSC or otherwise, so I appreciate that very much I apologize for asking to come back on point on the same subject So I apologize commissioners, but I paid my full fare So I'm gonna get to go on all the rides on the amusement park today. So that concludes. I have no further questions. Thank you Mr. Rather, I believe you one more question. Yeah, and it's on the same point. Don't go away Because one thing you didn't mention is what I would call consumer deficit Namely, I bought it for 25 bucks and I say it's a piece of crap And I don't like it and so I'm sure that there is a an unmeasurable number of people out there But that would be something that I would also include in a calculation but the on a more serious point in picking up on Commissioner Mohorovic's Point at first while I thought the economic analysis was really quite good And I personally think it sells it short to say that the lost utility cannot be measured I think it cannot be measured with precision, but it does seem to me you get a pretty good range You can say using a hypothetical and based on data that you already have that the consumer surplus is very unlikely to rise above X Or unlikely to fall below X and if you were to Calculate that and to me using as sort of your baseline what consumers actually paid for it that I don't understand why we couldn't give a range of that of the Consumer lost consumer utility and the reason I say that is because almost any scenario I could imagine I did a little bit of calculation The cost-benefit ratio is still so positive that this rule is easily justifiable So I think that might address some of the concerns that have been raised because it just seems in a sense Dismissive to say well, we can't measure it But in fact, I think you actually did a better job than you're giving yourself credit for I mean We could you could look at it a little bit differently and think how much consumer surplus Would you have to lose to make the benefits less than the costs and you could do that? I mean if we take as a given the twenty eight point six million and the Producers are plus loss of six million which you know those are approximations. They aren't exact exact, but if we take them the difference between those is About about 23 million Now if you doubled the price of the magnet set from twenty twenty five dollars to fifty dollars and We could say that consumers would have been willing to pay fifty dollars for it Then the then the benefits would approximately equal the costs So you could say so if you think that it's outrageous that anybody be willing to spend fifty dollars for this product Then you might conclude given the other assumptions We've made the analysis that the benefits are greater than the costs If you think that people would have been willing to pay 125 dollars for these then then then then you can't you can't say that But you can do these what if Well, I think you actually even have better data than that because I assume somebody who's a profit-seeking Entrepreneur is going to do his or her best to figure out what that demand curve is and to pretty much calculate that Maybe twenty five dollars Gets me there and if I raise it five dollars more. I'm probably gonna lose overall revenue So it seems to me that if you believe in all the economic models We were taught when we were taking introductory economics that you could say that That this the actual price fairly approximates the optimal Pricing number for the product, but at least with some variation. I guess I just repeat what I'm saying I think we actually have more useful data and I think you did a better job than I hear you giving yourself credit for Okay Well, I would still say that that that we can't really quantify what the loss and consumer surplus is I agree, but you could give a range and that that's all I'm saying so I'm sorry, I interrupt you do and I apologize for that. Well, I guess I guess I don't really have anything else to add But if you want to talk about this some more, I'll be I'll be around. It's interesting stuff. Thank you very much Mr. Robinson, I Mr. Mohorovic this concludes the Commissioners questions and with that I would like to thank the staff who participated today. Dr. Garland mr. Camero's dr Dr. Rogers and with that this concludes this public meeting of the US Consumer Product Safety Commission