Just over the last few days we've heard a flood of stories about plastic window blinds that pose health risks for children.

The offending items are sold under a variety of names, and are made from 2-1/2 centimeter-wide strips of polyvinyl chloride, the same kind of plastic commonly found in vinyl siding, flooring, not to mention shower curtains, garden hoses and records. Only these simple blinds contain extra added lead, which is supposed to keep the plastic strips firm and the colored dye in place.

It's sad to say, but this issue of household toxic products is not an isolated problem. Lead, among other toxins, is used in many items we take for granted every day. You might remember that just a few years ago, regular leaded gasoline was still for sale. Lead also used to be a common ingredient in many paints. But the majority of lead -- almost 78 percent of all lead in use -- is still used in lead-acid batteries. Over 70 million lead-acid automobile batteries are used every year in North America -- and only two-thirds of them are recycled. The rest are disposed of unsafely in incinerators or garbage dumps -- ways which allow the lead to enter our environment.

When batteries are collected, it is a fairly straight-forward process for the lead to be reclaimed, re-melted and used again. In this case, the lead stays inside the batteries and we don't have to risk getting in contact with it.

In the case of the PVC blinds, there isn't as much choice in the matter. There are really no preventative measures that can be taken to ensure that you or your children won't be exposed to lead, except getting rid of the blinds themselves.

A statement has been made by the U.S. window covering industry that suggests the lead dust can be removed by washing down the blinds once a year. This doesn't really get anywhere near the heart of the issue.

Children are primarily at risk of lead poisoning from these faulty products, the media reports tell us. The plastic breaks down when it gets exposed to sunlight. Dust from the disintegrated plastic contains lead, which children can get on their hands and eventually in their mouths.

It's not enough to take preventative measures to make sure that the blinds won't be touched by inquisitive juvenile hands. Lead poisoning can cause brain damage and retard motor skills -- obviously we don't want to have anything with these kind of side-effects around the places we live.

A question comes to my mind -- how did these products find their way onto store shelves in the first place? When manufacturers in Canada and the United States have stringent regulations which restrict lead use in household products, how can deadly toxins sneak into our homes under the guise of something as apparently innocuous and so very common as these colored plastic window coverings? And why was somebody making them in the first place?

In our current global economy, trade goes in all directions. Computers have given us the ability to communicate and do business faster and over longer distances than ever before. The plastic blinds in question were made in several different countries, including China, Taiwan, Mexico and Indonesia.

How can something like this be prevented in the future? Who will monitor manufacturing activities across the entire globe? There's no quick and easy, soap and water solution to this one.

This is one of the greatest challenges facing us in our continuing struggle to improve our environment -- we must work together in the shared aim of creating a healthy world for our children.