Children’s jewelry and fashion accessories from online marketplaces including Shein, Amazon, and TikTok Shop continue to test positive for lead and cadmium at levels far exceeding federal legal limits — and the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC) warns that children absorb these metals through skin contact and ingestion on a cumulative basis that causes irreversible harm. There is no safe level of lead exposure in children.
How Children Are Exposed Through Jewelry
Children wearing jewelry are exposed to toxic metals through two primary routes. First, direct skin contact: metals in jewelry leach slowly through sweat and skin contact. Fine jewelry items worn against skin for hours at a time, every day, can deliver a consistent low-level dose of lead or cadmium that accumulates in the body over time. Second, hand-to-mouth contact: children touch their jewelry frequently and then touch their mouths. Any lead on the surface of a jewelry item is transferred to the hands and ingested.
CPSC requires that children’s jewelry contain no more than 100 parts per million of lead in accessible component parts and no more than 300 parts per million of cadmium. Testing of items sold through Shein and other online platforms has repeatedly found lead and cadmium levels orders of magnitude above these limits.
What Lead and Cadmium Do to Children
Lead causes permanent brain damage at any level of exposure. Effects include reduced IQ, learning and behavioral disorders, attention deficit disorder, and developmental delays. These effects are not reversed when exposure ends — the damage is permanent. Cadmium is a carcinogen and a kidney toxin.
What to Do Right Now
- Remove all children’s jewelry purchased from Shein, Amazon, TikTok Shop, or any other online marketplace without verified safety testing.
- Only purchase children’s jewelry from established retailers that can provide documentation of third-party testing against CPSC lead and cadmium limits.
- Check SaferProducts.gov for any children’s jewelry products that have been officially flagged or recalled.
To report a dangerous product or a product-related injury, visit SaferProducts.gov or call CPSC’s Hotline at 800-638-2772.
Source: https://www.cpsc.gov/Safety-Education/Safety-Guides/Toys/Lead-in-Children-Jewelry
