TAIF, 3 September 2007 — A three-year-old girl died on Friday after swallowing a small battery cell from a toy.
The child’s parents said that although, after some time, the girl passed the battery in her stool, she later showed severe fatigue and was taken to a children’s hospital in Taif where she died, the Okaz newspaper reported yesterday.
Small batteries found in toys and watches are hazardous to children and have been proved to be fatal. There are several toys that are currently banned in the Kingdom because of harmful components and hazardous paint.
Toy maker Mattel Europe announced recently that it was withdrawing stocks of its toys that do not fulfill the Saudi safety standards from the local market. The recall comes as some of the toys are found to have loose magnets that posed a hazard to children.
