For those new to this website:
Tamara Rubin is a multiple-Federal-award-winning independent advocate for childhood Lead poisoning prevention and consumer goods safety, and a documentary filmmaker. She is also a mother of Lead-poisoned children (two of her sons were acutely Lead-poisoned in 2005). Since 2009, Tamara has been using XRF technology (a scientific method used by the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission) to test consumer goods for toxicants (specifically heavy metals — including Lead, Cadmium, Mercury, Antimony, and Arsenic). All test results reported on this website are science-based, accurate, and replicable. Items are tested multiple times to confirm the test results for each component tested. Tamara’s work was featured in Consumer Reports Magazine in February of 2023 (March 2023 print edition).
Here’s a link to the PDF downloaded from the CPSC’s site for this report.
Here’s a link to the PDF of the confirmation of the report sent to us by the CPSC.
Below is the language that we submitted, along with the report.
Published/Reported: August 26, 2023 — Saturday
Multiple infants and toddlers tested positive for unsafe levels of Lead in their blood following the use of WeeSprout (aka Wee Sprout) glass baby food storage jars with white Lead-painted logos on the outside of the jar. Lead Safe Mama, LLC received multiple reports of these incidents following our June 2022 discovery and reporting (on social media) of high-Lead content paint on these products. We discovered this issue during a home consultation with a family in Washington State who had an unexplained elevated blood Lead level in an infant (under 1-year-old). This family lived in a new construction home with no apparent structure-related potential contributors to the child’s elevated blood Lead level. After sharing about this issue with the public (and the readership on our website) we received several additional reports of families with a similar situation. XRF test results for the painted area of the products in question came in at 3,234 parts per million Lead — far in excess of the CPSIA limit of 90 ppm for the paint, glaze, or coating of any component of any item intended for use by children. On March 10, 2023, we published a comprehensive detailed report of the issue on our website — which you can read on this link: https://tamararubin.com/2023/03/wee-sprouts-baby-feeding-jars-painted-with-high-lead-paint-a-violation-of-the-cpsia-of-2008-with-criminal-penalties-possible/.
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We subsequently purchased several new products from this company (WeeSprout) and (in combination with reports from our community and readers of our website) determined that WeeSprout was (by this time — March 2023) aware of the Lead paint on their products (likely in response to our June 2022 reporting). They have since switched to embossed logos on their glass jars — with no painted components. While their new products are not painted with high-Lead paint (with illegal and unsafe levels of Lead), Lead Safe Mama readers reported purchasing the painted versions of the product (from Amazon and other vendors) as late as early 2023.
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In response to our reporting, several parents have submitted violation reports to the CPSC and were able to locate these on your website by searching for both “WeeSprout” with no space and “Wee Sprout” with a space. These reports appear to have been filed with your agency between March of 2023 and May of 2023.
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Fundamentally, the issue at hand is that it is now August 2023. This is fourteen months after we initially reported on the issue. This is more than 5 months after you received violation reports from consumers, yet there has still been no public (highly visible) CPSC-supported recall for these Lead-contaminated glass baby feeding products.
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On behalf of the Lead Safe Mama parent advocacy community, we are herewith demanding an immediate highly visible CPSC-supported recall for these illegal, unsafe Lead-contaminated baby feeding products. Separately we would like to encourage you to levy appropriate civil and criminal penalties against the company as they both sold their product as “Lead-free” and continued to communicate with customers insisting that they were Lead-free (apparently after they were made aware of the issue — see images of communications with customers) and then silently removed the Lead-paint from their products with no public notification of the concern for (and illegal nature of) the previous iteration of their products and no recall of their known Lead-contaminated products.
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Given the CPSC’s published statement that “If you are a manufacturer, importer, distributor, and/or retailer of consumer products, you have a legal obligation to immediately report (this) type of information to the CPSC” and “when in doubt, report” combined with WeeSprout’s inaction in this matter, we hope the penalties levied will be commensurate with the crime perpetrated against their customers (especially in light of the false advertising associated with these products). Only through holding these companies accountable with appropriate fines, penalties, recalls and other swift and aggressive actions will we (as a nation and a planet) see a cessation of the manufacture and sale of Lead-contaminated child feeding products. Thank you. Absent a highly visible pubic recall these unsafe and illegal products will continue to be in use by children across the United States.
Confirmation Emails & Screenshots for this submission
Report No 20230826-FE26F-2147345546
We have these with green paint. I am wondering if the green also has high level of lead. I know you have a lot to test but if you could get your hands on a green version I’d greatly appreciate it! I find the hard very convenient and would rather not throw them away if it’s not necessary!
Thank you!
What’s the best way to dispose of these older painted jars? WeeSprout was kind enough to send us a replacement set of raised-glass jars. Would the CPSC take the painted jars for testing?