Arkansans share personal stories in bid to change laws
Last updated Thursday, February 7, 2008 8:08 PM CST in News
By Aaron Sadler
THE MORNING NEWS
WASHINGTON - The waiting room was a torture chamber for Shelby Esses of Jacksonville.
Her 1-year-old son Jack slipped into a coma Oct. 30 after he swallowed the popular children's toy Aqua Dots. Esses braced for the worst each time she received reports from the emergency room on her son's condition.
"While they were working on him, we couldn't be back with him there," Esses said Thursday. "And every time they came out to give us an update on our son, I thought they were going to tell me that my boy was going to die."
Esses later learned that the Aqua Dots, when ingested, caused the same chemical reaction as the "date rape" drug Rohypnol.
After six hours in a coma and some time in the intensive care unit at Arkansas Children's Hospital in Little Rock, Jack awoke. He was given a clean bill of health and had no further complications.
But the scare pushed Esses toward an effort to get Aqua Dots off retail store shelves.
She complained to the Consumer Product Safety Commission, who she said was too sluggish in its response to the matter. The product had been identified as one of the Top 10 toys for Christmas, she said.
Aqua Dots were recalled a week after Jack's illness.
"To some, they might think it happened quickly," she said. "But really, after all the news came out about it, I started hearing about couples whose children had experience like our son ... and I was so angry. I was angry this didn't happen sooner."
Esses urged the Senate on Thursday to pass a bill to overhaul the commission and institute new testing standards for children's products.
The legislation sponsored by Sen. Mark Pryor, D-Ark., cleared the Senate Commerce Committee but has stalled in the full Senate.
Esses and other parents of children injured by dangerous toys told their harrowing stories at a Capitol Hill news conference.
They said the CPSC needs more employees and a bigger budget. In addition, independent testing laboratories should give the OK to children's products before they hit the shelves.
"You can't have faith in going out and buying any sort of toy at this point and knowing that you're going to bring home something safe into your home," Esses said.
Just a few minutes after Esses recounted her child's ordeal, another Arkansan lamented his own plight at a Senate committee hearing.
George Harper of Mayflower said he was charged for supplemental Medicare insurance that he did not want. He blamed an Altus insurance agent for enrolling him in the program against his wishes.
Lawmakers maintained there needs to be some federal oversight into the marketing and sale of Medicare Advantage and other private Medicare plans.
Unscrupulous salespeople sometimes say they are selling "Medicare benefits," then manipulate seniors into paying for private supplements.
"As senior citizens, we do need someone to keep us safe in our few days of life that are left," Harper said.
Harper, 72, told the Senate Finance Committee his signature was forged on a document that enrolled him in the Care Improvement Plus insurance plan. A total of $128 in premiums was deducted from his and his wife's monthly Social Security checks before he could get out of the program.
"These people were operating under false pretenses that they represent Medicare," he said. " ... Don't bury us before we die. It seems like the system is working against us, in a sense, more than it is working to help us."
Bill Perkins of Altus tried to sell the plan to Harper. He blamed Care Improvement Plus for the error and denied forging Harper's signature.
An Arkansas Insurance Department investigation is ongoing.
In a statement, Care Improvement Plus said it "promptly initiated a retroactive cancellation" of the Harpers' enrollment.
"Based on our investigation and the evidence collected, we counseled the agent involved regarding our enrollment process to ensure that this situation does not occur with him again," the statement stated.
Perkins, 73, said he, too, is a Medicare recipient who tries to sell his clients the private supplement that best fits their needs.
"We did everything by the book, all the way through," Perkins said.
Sen. Max Baucus, D-Mont., said the Senate may consider new rules for marketing private Medicare plans if necessary.
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