Water beads are small, colorful, superabsorbent polymer balls that can look a lot like candy, making them especially appealing for babies and small children who tend to explore the world by putting things in their mouths. The beads can expand dramatically inside a child’s body and cause life-threatening intestinal obstruction. Other harms can also follow when children either breathe water beads into their lungs or insert them into their ears or noses.
Orbeez packages have “choking risk” warning labels, which, the complaint alleges, does not adequately inform parents of the more severe risks involved. That warning actually amounts to deceptive advertising, the plaintiffs argue, because it leads parents to believe that there are no other risks that they would need to be aware of.
Additionally, the complaint continues, the beads are made of a material that does not always show up on an X-ray. So if a child swallows a water bead and becomes sick as a result, this can make it even harder for healthcare providers to correctly diagnose that expanded water beads are to blame.
These “material omissions” from Orbeez packages—about the risk of intestinal obstruction and the fact that they won’t be detected by X-ray—the complaint alleges, are deceptive and misleading. The parents bringing the case probably wouldn’t have bought these toys if they had known about these dangers, according to their complaint.
“This is a child’s toy with life-threatening risks that are just not disclosed at all,” Katherine Bruce, a partner at Clarkson Law Firm, said in an interview. “The bare modicum of effort would be to warn parents. Just pure and simple, warn them.”
The plaintiffs ask the court to demand that the makers of Orbeez either drastically change how they are marketed, or else stop selling them entirely. They are also asking for monetary compensation for the consumers who bought Orbeez without understanding the dangers they pose.
“We think the fact that they’re not putting a warning is telling,” said Timothy Giordano, another partner at Clarkson. “We think the concern that they have is that, were they to put this warning, parents wouldn’t buy the toys. And our conversations that we’ve been having with [parents] suggests that that is the case. So to us, it’s a classic case of putting profits over safety.”
The defendants of the case are the current owner of the Orbeez brand, toy company Spin Master, and its previous owner, the Maya Group. Neither has formally responded to the complaint. Spin Master did not respond to CR’s questions about the lawsuit, and the Maya Group could not be reached.
