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Holiday Home Safety Tips

Agency: HUD

The Department of Housing and Urban Development's (HUD) Office of Lead Hazard Control and Healthy Homes (OLHCHH) offers the following Holiday Home Safety Tips, including tips specifically relevant to children and factors likely to be in a child's environment over the holidays.

Holiday Home Safety Tips

Decorations

• Inspect holiday lights each year before you put them up. Throw away
  light strands with frayed or pinched wires.
• Use only non-combustible and flame-resistant materials to trim a tree. Choose tinsel and artificial icicles of plastic and non-leaded metals.
• Avoid trimmings that resemble candy and food that may tempt a young child to put them in his mouth.
• Keep any ribbons on gifts and tree ornaments shorter than 7 inches. A child could wrap a longer strand of ribbon around their neck and choke.
• Poinsettias are known to be poisonous to humans and animals, so keep them well out of reach, or avoid having them.

Entertaining

• Never leave cooking food unattended on the stove or in the oven.
• Only fry a turkey outside and away from your home or other flammable materials. Never use turkey fryers in an enclosed area like the garage or on the porch.
• Test your smoke alarms, and let guests know what your fire escape plan is.

• Check the food recall list this holiday season https://www.fda.gov/safety/recalls-market-withdrawals-safety-alerts

Toys

• Follow age guidance and other safety information on toy packaging and choose toys that match each child's interests and abilities.
• Keep small balls and toys with small parts away from children younger than age 3 and keep deflated balloons away from children younger than age 8. 
• Electric toys should be UL/FM approved.
• Check the recall list when purchasing toys  https://www.cpsc.gov/Safety-Education/Safety-Education-Centers/Toys

Trees

• When purchasing an artificial tree, look for the label "fire-resistant."
• Cut a few inches off the trunk of your tree to expose the fresh wood. This allows for better water absorption and will help to keep your tree from drying out and becoming a fire hazard.
• Real Christmas trees like cypress and the ever-popular pine can collect a high amount of pollen from other plants before they are cut down. This can trigger asthma and hay fever symptoms once you bring them home, especially if you put them up indoors.
  • Hose down your real tree before you bring it into the house. This will help to wash off the allergens.
  • If you notice increased asthma or allergy symptoms, move your tree outside.
• Artificial trees can also cause asthma and allergy symptoms as they accumulate dust, dust mites and even mold in storage.
  
  • Give your artificial tree a good shake outdoors, before putting it up inside.  
  • Vacuum your artificial tree and decorations as you get them out of the box, unpacking them outside if possible.

  • Wash your hands after handling light and artificial Christmas trees as they have lead and PFAS.

The contents of this email are for information purposes only and do not reflect the official views or endorsement of the Task Force or any of its member agencies.