 We are live morning and welcome to this public meeting as a consumer product safety commission. Before we start, I confirm that all the commissioners are here. Commissioner Bianco, you're muted. I do that every time. Don't I am here. Commissioner Feldman. The indicated is here through the chat. Commissioner Trump. I'm here. Good morning. Good morning. Commissioner Boyle. Good morning. Good morning. This morning, the staff will breathe the commission on a draft final rule to establish a consumer product safety standard for magnets. The rule on magnets was developed after years of work at the commission focused on preventing the devastating arm primarily to children and teenagers. When just small, powerful magnets, too many parents have learned these magnets can attach to one another or to certain metals through tissue walls ripping through internal organs, blocking the digestive systems and cause long term damage and even death. This draft rule brings together the years of research and instant reports and understanding of the market more than 700 public comments to propose. Performance requirements for certain magnet products under section 7 and 9 of the consumer product safety act. In a moment, I'll turn this meeting over to the staff so that they can brief us when they have completed the briefing. Each commissioner will have 10 minutes to ask questions of staff with multiple rounds necessary. As a reminder, if you have questions that address the agency's legal authority, they should be asked during a closed executive session. Take sent that as requested. It can be held later on today following this public hearing briefing us today. You have 2 individuals of Stephen or Shawnee engineering psychologist with the division of human factors director for engineering sciences and project manager for magnets and. He, Kim, attorney in the regulatory affairs division also joining us are Jason Levine, CPC's executive director, general counsel and acting commission secretary. That I'm going to turn the microphone over to Mr Shawnee and miss Kim. Good morning, we are honored to meet with you today. You're ready, we can move on to the next slide. Sorry, 1 more slide please for the agenda. I will start us off with a discussion of the rule making process for the draft final rule. Afterwards, I'll review the subject products, the hazard. The NPR and public comments on the NPR and the updated incident data analysis since the NPR. Then I'll describe the draft final rule and the economic analysis pertaining to the rule. Lastly, I'll summarize the main points from today's discussion. And I'll pass it on to high on slide. Good morning. My name is, I am Kim. I'm an attorney in the office of the general counsel, the commission may issue a final role for the safety standard of magnets under section 7 and 9 of the consumer product safety act. The commission commits the rule making with a notice of proposed rule. In January, 2022 under section 7 and 9 to address the unreasonable risk of injury and death. Associated with ingestion of loose or separable high powered magnets section 7 of the CPSA authorizes the commission to issue consumer product safety standards that consist of performance requirements. And requirements for warnings or instructions. These requirements must be reasonably necessary to prevent or reduce an unreasonable risk of injury associated with the product. The unreasonable risk inquiry involves balancing the likelihood and severity of the injury. Against the effect the regulation could have on manufacturers and consumers. Next slide, in addition, before promulgating a consumer product safety rule. The commission must consider and make certain findings under section 9 of the CPSA. These findings are set forth here. They include findings that show the public's need for the rule and the effect of the rule on the utility cost and availability of the product. At the benefits of the role, they are a reasonable relationship to its costs that the role imposes the least burdensome requirement that would adequately reduce the risk of injury. The CPSA requires that these findings be supported by the substantial evidence on the record. Next slide. The final rule must also provide a regulatory analysis, describing the rules, potential costs and benefits, discuss alternatives to the role and summarize issues raised by comments on the initial regulatory analysis. Next slide. Under the CPSA, if a voluntary standard has been adopted and implemented that relates to the same risk of injury as the role the commission is considering, the commission cannot promulgate a final rule unless it finds that when the voluntary standard is not likely to eliminate or adequately reduce the risk of injury, or two, it is unlikely that there will be substantial compliance with the voluntary standard. The rule before you addresses six relevant standards that are applicable to the magnet ingestion hazard. However, as we will discuss, none of the standards are likely to eliminate or adequately reduce the risk of injury associated with magnet ingestion hazards that are addressed in the rule before you. Steve Harshani will now discuss the product and the hazard associated with subject magnet products. Next slide. Thank you. The subject products are consumer products designed, marketed or intended to be used by consumers for entertainment, jewelry, including children's jewelry, mental stimulation, stress relief, or a combination of these purposes, and that contain one or more looser separable magnets. As I'll discuss in the coming slides, the draft final rule has the same product scope as the NPR, but with several exemptions clarified and codified. Our primary concern for these products is the magnet internal interaction hazard, which we typically refer to as the magnet ingestion hazard. That is, deaths and serious injury associated with the ingestion of multiple hazardous magnets or a hazardous magnet in a ferromagnetic object. The draft final rule identifies magnets as hazardous consistent with ASTM and other international standards and prohibitions as magnets that are small objects and have a magnetic flux index of 50 or greater. Hazardous magnets are small enough to be ingested and strong enough to interact internally through body tissue and resist natural bodily forces to separate. This internal interaction has led to deaths and non-fatal acute and long-term adverse health consequences from volgulous, histiline, perforations, and other injuries. Medical management of magnet ingestion has inherent health risks, both from less invasive procedures such as serial imaging and anesthesia and endoscopies, and more invasive procedures such as laparotomies, resections, and other types of surgical intervention. Next slide, please. On January 10, 2022, the Commission published the NPR for magnets in the Federal Register under Section 7 and 9 of the Consumer Product Safety Act. Under the proposed rule, each loose or separate magnet in the subject magnet product would be required to meet the following criteria. One, the two large to fit entirely within the small part cylinder described in 16 CFR, Section 1501.4, or two, have a flux index of less than 50. That is, weak enough that they are less likely to cause internal interaction injuries if ingested. In other words, the proposed rule extended to the subject magnet products, the magnet strength and size requirements specified in the toy standard, ASTM-963, which is codified in 16 CFR Part 1250. The NPR would exempt products subject to ASTM-963 because these products must already meet the proposed magnet strength and size requirements. Additionally, the NPR would exclude other products that do not meet the criteria for some subject magnet products, such as certain products intended for home, kitchen, education, research, commercial, and industrial uses. Next slide, please. The NPR provided an assessment of existing domestic and international standards and prohibitions and other alternatives to the proposed rule and showed that the proposed rule is necessary. The proposed rule is similar to prohibitions in other countries, such as Canada, Australia, New Zealand, and member states of the European Commission. Safety messaging, including public awareness raising efforts, has historically been ineffective at addressing the hazard for numerous reasons, most notably because consumers are unlikely to anticipate and appreciate the likelihood and nature of the hazard, particularly as it involves older children and teens. Packaging requirements, such as child resistant packaging, would be ineffective for the majority of the known ages involved in magnet ingestion incidents. Adversive agents, such as foul odors and biterance, has historically been ineffective at preventing ingestion of hazardous objects and substances. The estimated annual benefits of the proposed rule, that is the reduction in societal costs, far exceeds the estimated annual costs, such as lost utility for consumers and lost income for companies. To the extent that unidentified magnet products involved in ingestion incidents were products subject to the proposed rule, which staff assesses as likely, the estimated annual benefits could be substantially higher. Staff concluded that magnet ingestants involving unidentified magnet products generally involve products that would be covered by the proposed rule because of the following factors, among others. One, the known products involved in magnet ingestion incidents, that is, of the known products involved in magnet ingestion incidents, the subject magnet products and uses constitute a much larger proportion of the cases than the excluded products, particularly when considering cases that resulted in surgery. Two, the success of ASTM S963 in reducing the number of children's toys involved in magnet internal interaction injuries. And three, incidences of NICE, CFIS-RMS and Poison Center reported magnet ingestants relative to the vacated rule on magnet sets. We'll elaborate on these points in the following slides as we discuss staff's updated incident data analysis following NPR. Next slide, please. The commission's NPR requested comments from the public on all aspects of the proposed rule, such as the scope and definitions, performance requirements, safety messaging and packaging requirements, existing standards, staff's cost-benefit analysis, and the effective date of the rule. On March 2, 2022, CPSC held an oral hearing regarding the proposed rule, at which time five comments were presented. CPSC received 713 written comments on the NPR during the public comment period, which closed on March 28, 2022, and we received three additional comments after the period closed. All comments were considered, including the late-filed comments, two of which were from manufacturers of subject magnet products. Most two commented in favor of the proposed rule were medical professionals and or representatives of consumer advocacy groups and medical associations. And there were some consumers and a subject magnet product manufacturer who also supported the proposed rule. The groups and associations included, among others, representatives from the American Academy of Pediatrics, the American Pediatric Surgery Association, the North American Society for Pediatric Astroenterology, Hepatology and Nutrition, Safe Kids Central California, the Canadian Pediatric Society's Injury Prevention Committee, Consumer Reports, Kids in Danger, Consumer Federation of America, the Children's Safety Network at the Education Development Center and the Pacific Institute for Research and Evaluation, and Safe Kids worldwide. These commenters tended to view the proposed rule as a minimum and critically important standard by which to address the hazard. And then alternative, less stringent approaches are unlikely to be effective. In contrast, most two commented in opposition to the proposed rule were consumers as well as several subject magnet product manufacturers and hobbyist groups, such as the Hobby Manufacturers Association, the Magnet Safety Association, and Magnets and Nanomagnetics. Commenters opposed to the proposed rule generally affirmed that an all-ages prohibition is not reasonable, that ASTM S3458-21, the voluntary standard of safety messaging and packaging requirements for adult magnet sets, is a viable alternative, and that there are other hazards that are far more dangerous than magnets, such as regarding automobiles, firearms, and trampolines. Many also claim that the proposed strength and size limitations are both unnecessary and costly in terms of lost product utility and harm to small businesses. Many comments understated, though, the frequency of the incidence of the hazard, describing magnet ingestions as a few, several, or handful. And these commenters claim that specific companies had no incidence of magnet ingestion involving their subject magnet products. Next slide, please. Staff is aware of seven deaths since 2005, associated with ingestion of hazardous magnets, five of which occurred in the U.S., and this has not changed since the NPR's analysis. The updated NICS and CPSRMIS data analysis covers January 1, 2010, through December 31, 2021, adding one year to the analysis for the NPR. In general, staff's analysis of the updated data affirms the NPR analysis. The following NICS-based estimates are regarding the in-scope products, which include all magnet ingestion incident data other than data involving products identified as not subject to the rule. Staff estimates 25,000 cases from 2010 through 2021 were in scope. Staff estimates 2,500 cases in 2021, which is higher than the majority of the preceding years, including 2018 through 2020, demonstrating that cases have continued to rise. An estimated 5,000 victims, like 20% of the 25,000, were hospitalized or transferred to another hospital. In comparison, for the same timeframe, injuries from all toys combined had a hospitalization rate under 5%. Regarding the CPSRMIS incidents involving in-scope products, 362 incidents were reported to have occurred from 2010 through 2021, including 105 incidents reported since NPR. At least 156 incidents resulted in surgical intervention, including 43 reported since the NPR. It's important to note that the CPSRMIS reports are commonly received years after the incidents occurred, meaning that the actual counts of magnet ingestions are potentially higher than reported at this time, especially for year 2021 and other recent years. Next slide, please. Regarding the NICE cases, where product type was identified or described, magnet sets, magnet toys, and jewelry were the most common, but the majority were of unknown product type. Most of the CPSRMIS cases involved magnet sets, followed by products identified or described as magnet toys than jewelry. Relatively few cases involved identified out-of-scope products, such as home and kitchen products, particularly cases resulting in surgical intervention and signs of internal interaction. As I explained before, staff concludes it is likely that a substantial proportion of the unidentified magnet products were, in fact, subject magnet products. Where specified, the majority of the magnet ingestions involved playing with magnets at the time of the incident, followed by use as jewelry. Accidental ingestion of magnets was common, whereas intentional ingestion was rarely reported. Sharing of magnets between children was also commonly reported. Next slide, please. Detail in the NPR, staff and other researchers examined NICE, CPSRMIS, and Poison Control Center data and concluded that the 2014 magnet set rule was effective in reducing magnet ingestion incidents. The magnet set rule, just vacated by the 10th circuit in 2016, had similar requirements for the largest subset of subject magnet product involved in ingestion incidents, magnet sets. Starting this chart, staff estimated from the NICE data, 2,300 emergency department treated ingestions of in-scope magnets annually from 2010 through 2013, years prior to the announcement of magnet set rule, and 1,300 annually from 2014 through 2016, the years the rule was announced in place. For years 2017 through 2021, staff estimates 2,400 annual emergency department treated ingestions up from 2,300, which we had estimated for 2017 through 2020 in the NPR. This increase reflects the larger number of cases in 2021 than the preceding years 2018 through 2020. These trends over the past 12 years indicate that it is likely that a substantial proportion of magnet ingestions involves subject magnet products, including the cases in which the magnet product is not identified and that the magnet size and strength requirements in the draft final rule are effective in addressing the hazard. Next slide, please. Consistent with NPR under the draft final rule, each loose or separable magnet in a subject magnet product that fits entirely within the small part cylinder must have a flex index of less than 50, as measured by the procedures for determining the magnetic attractive force described in ASTMF 963. Also consistent with NPR, the draft final rule does not apply to toy subject to CCSE's mandatory toy standard in 16th C of R part 1250. The draft final rule includes clarifications to the NPR, that is, it codifies additional exempted products from the rule, which were mentioned as exclusions in the NPR. These exemptions are as follows, products manufactured, sold, and or distributed solely for school, research, professional, commercial, and or industrial purposes that contain one or more loose or separable magnets that are not designed, marketed, or intended to be used for entertainment, jewelry, stress relief, or a combination of these purposes. And two, products manufactured, sold, and or distributed solely for home use, such as hardware magnets that contain one or more loose or separable magnets and are not designed, marketed, or intended to be used for entertainment, jewelry, mental stimulation, stress relief, or a combination of these purposes. These clarifications address public comments on the NPR, that it was unclear what products are not subject to the rule. Based on the current data, staff agrees with comments that magnet products intended only for school, research, professional, commercial, and or industrial purposes should be exempt from the rule, even if the products are intended for mental stimulation, unless they are also intended for other subject magnet product uses. However, staff still concludes that products for home use are subject to the rule, even if they are intended for subject magnet product uses, including mental stimulation. Staff recommends the commission adopt the draft final rule to be effective 30 days after publication, with third-party testing requirements effective 90 days after publication. Next slide, please. The expected benefits of the rule are a reduction in the risk of death and serious injury to children and teens due to ingestion of hazardous magnets from the subject magnet products. Decisional costs associated with magnet ingestion injuries include the following considerations, among others. Medical costs, work loss, an intangible or non-economic cost of injury. On the other hand, the rule may result in loss to value experienced by consumers who would no longer be able to purchase subject magnet products with loose or separable hazardous magnets, as well as the lost profit to firms that could not produce and sell non-compliant products in the future. Public comments by sellers and consumers cite usefulness of the subject magnet products without size and strength limitations, including amusement, art, education, entertainment, stress relief, social, and innovative values, among others. In addition, internet data demonstrates that hazardous magnets from the subject magnet products, such as magnet sets, are also commonly used for jewelry. Staff's briefing package provides a range of estimates for between 100,000 and 1 million units sold annually. Assuming 500,000 units sold, staff estimates annual benefits of the rule to be $51.8 million, based on incident data from 2017 through 2021, excluding unidentified magnet products. Staff estimates annual costs from reduced annual consumer and producer surplus to be between $10 million and $17.5 million for this period. Thus, our estimates show that the potential benefits of the draft final rule would likely easily exceed the potential costs. Furthermore, to the extent that the unidentified magnet products involved in adjusting injuries were subject magnet products, which staff assesses as likely, the potential benefits of the draft final rule would be higher. For the same period, staff estimates annual benefits of the rule to be $167.9 million, just for the unidentified magnet products. A sensitivity analysis shows that even adding a relatively small portion of the nice cases involving unidentified magnet products to the base case substantially increases the estimated gross benefits of the rule. Next slide, please. Detailed in the briefing package, staff considered various alternative options to reduce the risk of the magnet internal interaction hazard, such as alternative performance requirements requiring safer packaging, warnings, aversive agents, using a later effective date, and relying on voluntary standards activities. While these alternative options would reduce the burden on companies and consumers that benefit from the use and sale of non-compliant products, staff concluded that less stringent alternatives to the draft final rule are not likely to adequately reduce the risk of injury associated with hazardous magnet ingestion. Next slide, please. Staff assesses that the draft final rule could have a significant adverse impact on a few small importers of subject magnet products, particularly importers of magnet sets, which are believed to receive nearly all their revenues from sales of subject magnet products. Again, staff reviewed less stringent alternatives to the draft final rule to determine if burdens associated with the rule could be lessened. The staff concluded that less stringent alternatives would not adequately address the hazard. As discussed in the NPR, affected manufacturers and importers may be able to market subject magnet products with compliant magnets. Staff has identified several companies that advertise subject magnet products, such as magnet sets, as having small object magnets with a flux index under 50. The draft final rule also incorporates additional exemptions. Next slide, please. Next slide, please. In summary, the draft final rule extends to certain amusement and jewelry products, such as magnet sets, the magnet size, and strength requirements established by STMF 963. That is, loose or separable magnets in these products cannot be hazardous magnets. The draft final rule is supported by the following factors, among others. Magnet adjustment trends and the associated deaths and injuries from these ingestions, known products involved, hazardous use patterns, CTSC recall activity, international standards and prohibitions, human factors and medical literature, and input from medical associations. Staff estimates the potential benefits of the rule easily, easily exceed the potential costs and substantially more to the extent that unidentified magnet products involved in nice reported incidents were products subject to the rule, which staff assesses this likely. Can move on to the next slide and that concludes the presentation. Thank you. Thanks to both of you for that briefing. As he pointed out, it's really unfortunate that the court struck down a rule earlier because I think in the end of the day, never large number of children were injured in the interim. But going into the details, Miss Kim, can you discuss how the draft rule would address the concerns 10 circuit had when it struck down the former. Magnet sets rule in 2016. In the Zen magnets case. The 10th circuit found three flaws with the commission's 2014 magnet sets rule. First, the court found fault with the data that the commission used to estimate the risk of injury for magnet sets, because it didn't include data from after 2012. When CPSC began compliance actions that reduced magnet set sales. The court stated that the downward trend in the injury rates should have been considered in the evaluation of the benefits of the role. For the rule before you. We've provided data for periods before, during, and after the effective period of the 2014 magnets set rule. The estimated number of magnet ingestions treated in US hospital emergency departments was lowest by a significant margin during the 2014 through 2016 period of the magnet sets role. This new information shows that a product safety role that addresses magnet ingestion hazards is effective in reducing injuries and deaths. The second fault that the court found was with CPSC's reliance on an estimate that 90% of the cited injury reports, possibly involved magnet sets. The court questioned whether the rule is reasonably necessary to eliminate or reduce an unreasonable risk of injury, given the uncertainty of real injury rates. For the rule before you detailed information on all magnet ingestion incidents have been provided. As discussed in the final regulatory analysis, the benefits from the rule far exceed the cost of the rule, even when unidentified magnet products are excluded. In addition, as explained by Mr. Harshani, the rule provides additional information on cases characterized as unidentified and finds that they are in fact, likely from likely to be subject magnet products. Based on the known products involved in the incidents. The success of the ASTM toy standard and reducing the magnet ingestion hazards and the data from the nice CPSRMS and poison center reported incidents. I would also note that the incident data analysis reviewed by the staff includes more comprehensive data than the 2014 magnet set rule, because that rule only covered magnet sets. The rule before the commission greatly expands the scope of products covered by the rule. Not only are magnet sets covered, jewelry is covered, including children's jewelry and also jewelry making sets. Finally, the court stated that the CPSC had not addressed the utility of magnet sets for scientific and math education, or as research tools. In the proposed rule, the commission specifically raised the issue of whether these types of products should be excluded and requested comment on them. The rule before you consider these issues and in response to comments provides specific exemptions from the rule. Magnets that are manufactured, sold and or distributed for home use or for school research professional commercial and or industrial purposes are exempt from the rule, unless they also meet the other criteria for subject magnet products. As discussed, the incident data did not show that magnet ingestion incidents are associated with those types of products. For all of these reasons, the issues identified by the 10th circuit when it vacated the 2014 magnet set rule have been addressed in this rule. Thank you, Mr. Kim and maybe Mr. Arshani you can expand upon what was Kim was saying and how this rule compares the scope to the vacated rule. Sure, as Ms. Kim explained, this rule expands the scope of what is considered hazardous magnets by modifying the performance requirements to consider magnets hazardous as they are small objects. And have a magnetic flux index of 50 or greater, as opposed to simply greater than 50 in line with changes to STMF 963. This rule also extends the product scope to capture other products likely to pose the magnet internal interaction hazard capturing all magnets designed marketed or to be used as for entertainment jewelry or stress release. Thank you and Mr. Arshani, the briefing package is unfortunately strengthened by the data regarding deaths and injuries from subject magnets before, during and after the effective period of the 2014 rule. It shows success of the rule and preventing injuries and increases incidents once these products were allowed back onto the marketplace. In fact, it shows a massive increase in the average annual estimated injuries when the rule went into effect, sorry, massive decrease from about 2300 per year to about 1300 per year. When the rule was vacated that number went right back up to 2400 per year. And these numbers are tragic and astounding. Mr. Arshani is reasonable to expect similar decrease incidents if this rule goes into effect. It is our expectation that the incidents will decrease appreciably if this rule goes into effect as written. From what we see in the data, magnet sets continue to be of primary concern. And the rule not only addresses magnet sets, but children's jewelry and certain other general use products as well. The staff assesses pose unreasonable risks of the magnet internal attraction hazard. Thank you Mr. Arshani. Ms. Kim, I'm going to turn to my fellow commissioners for questions that they may have as well. Turning by order of seniority, Commissioner Miyako. Thank you, Chairman. I thought the presentation was extremely thorough and I appreciate that and I have no questions. Great. Thank you, Commissioner Miyako. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Can you hear me? Yes, please go ahead. Great. Again, I want to thank you, Mr. Chairman, and to thank all the presenters today for the presentation. I agree with Commissioner Miyako that this was a thorough and thoughtful presentation. Obviously, this is an issue that's been in front of the commission for a while. As was discussed today, the 10th Circuit reviewed our previous action and struck down the rule. I think that that serves as an important reminder to all of us that CTSC's actions need to be underpinned by strong data sound science and that the agency not act in an arbitrary and capricious manner. We're going to be subject in the future to that kind of review. But on that front, in order to address some of the deficiencies that the 10th Circuit identified, one of the key aspects of the draft final rule that's in front of the agency right now is the carve out for scientific, industrial and home use magnets. I was wondering if you could speak a little bit about the enforcement implications that might arise because of that carve out. For example, how is our enforcement staff can be able to differentiate between magnets that fall squarely within the carve out that we're creating and other magnets that are impermeable. So, based on the current data staff assesses that the hazard is less likely to occur the exempted products, which has valuable functional utilities different from amusement and jewelry. Which are therefore less likely to be acquired and used by children and teens for playing in jewelry. Staff agrees with commenters that we need to remain vigilant regarding the exempted products to quickly address new hazard patterns and we will. The box scope is consistent with NPR, although we recommend exempting certain products designed market or intended for mental stimulation. Okay, I appreciate that answer, but it doesn't really answer the question. In terms of our staff in the field, looking at their products, how are they going to be able to clearly delineate between what's permissible and what falls within the scope of the exemption. Sure. We guard against against accurate sort of attempting to use the carve out that we're creating in terms of their marketing to effectively game the system. Commissioner Feldman. Just to perhaps caution, I think we wouldn't want to talk about compliance strategies in public session and you're raising your raising points which which can in part be discussed. I mean, James about to do so about, you know, how, how we interpret this draft rule, but in terms of the commission's compliance strategy, that's probably something that we'd want to discuss in a closed session. So, so without fair, I wasn't trying to discuss confidential information in a public session. So I'll reserve that question until later. Moving on with respect to the incident data. The numbers that that that we're basing this draft final rule on obviously tell a compelling story. But I'm curious in terms of in terms of looking at the incident data. We're differentiating between incidents involving small children and and adults obviously that the hazard patterns here that that we're most concerned about is, you know, ingestion by by small children that that that may not know anybody better and that fall into the vulnerable consumers category is have we done that granular breakdown. And does that tell us anything. We did consider ages and our detail analysis of the incident data and we found that the actually the vast majority of victims were were above age 5 and 16 or under. And we we put together the case before you based on that data to protect the vulnerable populations. Okay, I appreciate that response. I have no further questions at this time. Thank you very much. Thank you commission. Commissioner Trump. Thank you and thank you everyone for your work on this briefing package and for the presentation today. I'm glad that we're nearing resolution on this issue. This is a problem that the agency has already solved once. Before 2 judges substituted their judgment for that of the experts at this agency. And that resulted in scores of grave injuries to children. Now this agency stepping up once again to correct that injustice and the proposed final rule looks like it will keep kids safe from gruesome injuries tied to ingesting small magnets. I want to make sure to make sure we get there. I want to better understand the exemptions that are being considered and I've got some questions about that 1st 1. That applies to products manufactured sold and or distributed solely for school research professional commercial and or industrial purposes. So. Overall, the exemption applies to products that are manufactured, sold or distributed solely for those purposes that I just listed. So, this exemption. Doesn't apply to products sold to consumers on the open market. Correct. I mean, we're talking about products that would be sold through specialty channels tailored to those exempted settings. Yes. Great, you know, I think a little bit of clarity on that point in the final rule. I think it is clear to me, but in order to make that crystal clear, I think we might want to. Just make sure we do that in the final rule. And as we start with. The 5 categories in this exemption, I want to look at the school purposes exemption. And, you know, staff states in comment 12 that because these products are intended for use in school. As opposed to home settings and personally used by children. The magnet internal interaction hazard would be less likely to pose an unreasonable risk of injury to children or teens. So, so that exemption. Wouldn't include products that are personally used by children or teens. So, so I just wanted to clarify on that 1. When we talk about school purposes, we're talking about teachers using these products to model or explain, not students. Correct. It considers both particularly for older ages where our students will be hands on with them, but we're talking about a supervised environment. And products that are not designed marketed or intended to be used for any subject magnet product to use beyond mental stimulation. So, can you clarify where you said. Older that you gave some indication that older students might be more hands on with this. So, do we give some delineation as to whether this exemption is intended for college or graduate schools where students would be using this hand on. I mean, we're not talking about high school, middle school, elementary school for hands on use for kids. Are we. The exception is it's for all school use and the definition is based on review of the incident data, which did not show magnets for school use to be a significant hazard pattern. The magnets of concern are the magnets for for the subject magnet product uses, which would now be prohibited by the rule. Can you give me a sense of any specific legitimate uses of these powerful magnet sets in schools that we're aware of. Starting from the elementary school side. Yeah, absolutely. Magnets are used for educational purposes to teach basic principles and especially for younger ages and more complex principles of physics magnetism and electricity. Including basic geometry. Okay, I think I'm going to come back to that because I don't feel that we've seen the evidence that we need for an open ended school exemption that will allow children. To handle these magnets sets in elementary middle schools. Yeah, certainly not 1 that puts these in their hands, but, but there's probably a way to allow for more appropriate use in. You know, as the education progresses and children older, but I do want to. Test out sort of an oddball scenario here to my son was in kindergarten last year and his teacher had a set of small prizes that she handed out to kids for good behavior. I'm, I'm proud to report that my son earned a lot of those, but, but 1 day he came home with a magnet set. We immediately disposed of it, but, but what about something like that if, if there's sets of giveaway toys used by teachers, they include magnet sets. Those don't meet the proposed school purposes exemption. Do they. Now, subject magnets that's as defined in and proposed 16 CFR 12, 62 dot to be would apply as the magnets. Like they designed marketed or intended to be used for entertainment jewelry stress relief or a combination of these purposes. So, so, because these are. They're a toy essentially they would not be allowed by this exemption. Okay. Now, we've got a professional purposes exemption and research purposes exemption. And I just wanted to understand the interaction between the 2 to the extent there is some. So, is the research purposes exemption. Is that only intended for academic research like post secondary school research. It was encompassing for various research purposes, including academic medical defense. Um, et cetera. Okay. Um. What can you give us some examples of specific academic research that we're aware of? So, similar to industrial use magnets are used for various innovative purposes. Sorry, my, I'm not agreeing with me at the moment. So. Can I get back to this at a later time? Yeah, let me know when, when that, when that comes back and we can follow up. But, but I do want to be clear about 1 part of this. When we talk about research, can we be very clear that we're not talking about home research by children and teens? I mean, I don't want some nightmare scenario where teachers are sending intentionally sending these home with kids for their homework. Correct. Those would be magnets intended for home use. And that would not be allowed. Correct. Okay. Um, and, you know, I can picture professional, well, none of this, this goes back to the question you were getting back to me on the professional purposes. Um, well, maybe it doesn't. So, so actually. I can picture professional research, but I don't understand what professional purposes other than research might be. Do you have some sense of legitimate professional uses that we're trying to include with that part of the exemption. I believe several commenters raised modeling or sculpture building or architectural uses. Okay. Um, and then I think maybe the last 1, I'll ask about here is I'm certainly confused by the commercial purposes part of the exemption. I can't quite picture what this is and I want to make sure that we're not. Creating something that could be misinterpreted. You know, if I'm a real estate agent and I want to, you know, take 1 of these magnets that's put my business card on it and just send it out to prospective clients. That's not okay into the commercial purposes exemption. Is it? I mean, what are we talking about there? The commercial use examples include, for example, use on magnetic boards and a fixing items together among others. This exemption to which we're referring still covers all of the other subject magnet product uses other than mental stimulation. I'm so you said. For use on a magnet board. I don't know that. Can you explain what that is? Yeah, sorry about that a magnetic or ferro magnetic board, such as if you consider going into a restaurant and having items on the board. Just like to hold things up. Wouldn't that be wouldn't that be professional? It can be used professionally for that reason, but typically what we've seen is more for modeling and sculpture building such as as miss can put architecture. Well, you know, I guess I wonder, and we can think about this some more, but. The examples you gave for commercial, I wonder if they're redundant of if we cut commercial, don't those still fit under the professional exemption. Do we need commercial? I worry it adds a little bit of ambiguity that. I don't want to take an advantage of or legitimate confusion. I mean, either way. I'm happy to discuss this further after the briefing. I also want to emphasize that that this exemption is for products sold and distributed solely for these purposes. Fair enough, but I guess let's let's fill follow up on that. If you can kind of compare the list of possible uses between commercial and professional and and let me know if there's some that fit in 1 and not the other so that we might need both. But that's that's what I'm getting at there and industrial purposes. I'm not quite sure what they are, but I can probably picture those. That's that's all for me right now. Thank you. Thank you, commissioner commissioner boil. Thank you, Mr chair, and thank you to the staff for this thorough presentation and not only for the work on this. Rule, but for the last 10 years or more that all staff has been working on this at the agency. So I do appreciate that very much. I just have a couple of questions. A lot of them have already been asked just to follow up on some answers that have already been given. And Mr. Hirshani, I think in response to the chair question about the difference between the rule before us now and the vacated rule. You mentioned something about the flux. I understand the expansion of the scope in terms of jewelry. But I just want to make sure I understood what you said in terms of the difference of the flux if I heard you correctly. Yeah, sure. The, the vacated rule on magnets that was based on a previous iteration of the MS, which considered magnets hazardous if they were 50 had a magnetic flux index of 50. I'm sorry, if greater than 50. Whereas, and other international standards and prohibitions has since been updated to include 50 and therefore a hazardous magnet has a magnetic flux index of 50 or greater. And as a small object. So, for practical purposes, does that have a big implication or is that just for clarity? It's predominantly for clarity, but we also has tested magnets that were close to the limit. So it's. We found it important to go with what was determined by consensus to be the. The most appropriate number at this time. Okay, thanks. I appreciate that. I have a language question and I'm not sure who this is for maybe for miss Kim. Is there a difference between exclusion and exemption? I mean, if you could explain how we went from talking about exclusions to exemptions. And that's miss Kim would like to answer that the intent was just to emphasize that in the NPR, we only formally codified the exemption for toy subject. We provided as examples of other excluded. The products that are now being that we now recommend codifying formally with only change being mental stimulation for certain products. Thank you. I was on mute. Well, I was talking so I'll try again. For all intents and purposes. There is not much of a distinction between exclusion and exemption. When you write codified text, you would use the word exemption. Because that's a specific term that we use to exclude certain products in the code. For the purposes of the NPR, we use the word exclusion because we were really inquiring about it. We were asking the public to comment on it. And what they thought whether this should go outside the scope of the rule or not. So it's, it's more of a semantic distinction, but for the purposes of codification. I think the office of federal register would say exemption is proper. Okay, thank you. I appreciate that is another way to look at it though. Could we have looked at the definition and change the definition of subject matter product subject. Magnet product to talk about these exclusions as opposed to saying calling them an exemption would that have been a different way and acceptable way to approach it. We certainly considered. Except that there was some confusion about it when we. When we requested comments and asked about these specific issues, we got commenters saying. We're unclear as to what you mean. So in response to those comments, we felt it was necessary to be more explicit and clear. So the manufacturers understood and the consumers understood what was within the scope and what was outside the scope of the rule. Okay, thank you. And I do actually want to get back to something you just said, Mr. Herschani about the the mental stimulation. If you could explain to me a little bit more how we arrived at including that in the definition, but including it in the professional use, but not in the home use just to if you could walk through that for me. I'd appreciate it. Thank you. Yeah, absolutely. CPSC staff assesses that mental stimulation is an important criterion criterion for subject magnet products as it encompasses numerous uses that appeal to children and teens for home use. Such as puzzle working and sculpture building, which are common descriptions for subject magnet products like magnet sets. I agree with commenters that the term mental stimulation may be interpreted more broadly than we intended by capturing products not for home uses that may nonetheless be mentally stimulating. It's just those manufactured sold and or distributed solely for educated uses at schools and universities. Okay, thank you. I appreciate that. And then I just have some sort of small questions that I just wanted to get clarity on. If you don't mind, do bicycle helmets fall within the scope of the rule? I know there was a discussion of a recall that involved magnets and bicycle helmets and it was unclear to me which side of the line it fell on based on that. As a general matter, bicycle helmets are not within scope. We would evaluate if a specific helmet has loose or separable magnets that would meet the inclusion criteria. Regarding the case to which you're referring where I'm working with compliance on this and we'll get back to you after the briefing. Okay, thank you. I appreciate that. One other question I had was about the sellers of magnets. Are most of them overseas or domestic sellers? As we discussed in the package, while the majority of the manufacturers are overseas, most of the sellers in the past two years have been in the US. Okay, thanks. And 1 final question was just on the test methodology that staff developed. If you could just explain why staff developed its own methodology. Is it mandatory? Do labs have to follow that? The draft final rule uses the test methodology described in a 963, which is also used in other international standards and prohibitions. Showing an appendix in the appendix to have the of the briefing package staff provided recommendation for assisting testers and identifying accurately and consistently the flux, particularly for smaller diameter spherical magnets. This is those between 2 and 3 millimeters. The method is not mandatory. And it is consistent with the SDMS 963. Additionally, 1 of the commenters who represented a subject magnet product manufacturer described using a very similar method. Okay, thank you. I appreciate that. I don't have any other questions. Mr. share, but do you want to thank the staff again for all your hard work? I appreciate it. Thank you, commissioner. Just to make sure I want to get 1 point time commission. Some commissions that indicated desire to ask questions and a closed executive session dealing with confidential information. Is that correct? Yes. That given that request we're going to reconvene and close session at noon. Were there any other questions that commissioners want to raise at this point in time or seek a 2nd round for public questions or issues that can be discussed in public hearing none. I do want to thank the staff for the formative briefing so far and for the commissioners for the active participation. This briefing is now closed. I'll see the commissioners and staff at noon. Thank you. Thank you.