Preventing Poisonings At Home

In 2003, 78,000 children under 5-years-old - or one every seven minutes - visited U.S. hospital emergency rooms for unintentional poisonings. And most of those accidents were caused by items you may well have around your home, according to federal officials.

There are some easy steps you can take to try to ensure your family doesn't fall victim to such incidents, and they were spelled out on The Early Show Wednesday by Hal Stratton, the chairman of the Consumer Product Safety Commission Chairman.

"It's a huge problem," Stratton tells co-anchor Rene Syler, "and you know, you think about that number going to the hospital each year and kind of it's unfathomable for a parent to even put themselves in that situation, but it does happen. And 78,000 emergency room visits is way too many."

Some 30 children die every year due to accidental poisonings, and approximately 1 million phone calls are placed to poison control centers annually by adults seeking help when children have swallowed something harmful.

Among the potentially toxic household products involved with calls to poison centers were: