Radon could be in 15,000 Casamia products

Local bed manufacturer Casamia raised the estimate for the number of radioactive mattress topper sets it sold to customers from 12,395 to over 15,000 on Friday.

The company, acquired earlier this year by Shinsegae, is the second bed producer after Daijin Bed to confirm that its products emit dangerous amounts of radon, a radioactive chemical substance linked to cancer and various respiratory diseases.

On Friday, Casamia announced that it had sold an additional 3,000 Casaon Memotex mattress topper sets found to be radioactive through online shopping platforms Lotte Homeshopping, Home & Shopping and a site exclusively reserved for Samsung Fire & Marine Insurance employees.

The company began recalling Memotex mattress toppers on Tuesday, offering a full refund or exchange. It previously said it only sold 12,395 units of Casaon Memotex through home shopping channel CJ O Shopping between April and December in 2011.

Casaon Memotex is a product bundle that consists of a mattress topper, two pillows and one body pillow, which are larger and longer pillows that some people hug for comfort while sleeping. A mattress topper is a thin pad that can be placed on top of another mattress to make it more comfortable.

Casamia’s products first came under suspicion after a consumer told the company on June 28 that the Memotex mattress topper appeared to emit dangerous amounts of radon.

Casamia passed the information on to the Nuclear Safety and Security Commission on July 10, which then investigated the mattress toppers and pillows from three Casaon Memotex bundles. The radiation dose from two of the Memotex pads and one body pillow were tested to exceed the safety standard for processed products of 1 millisievert (mSv) per year at 1.52 mSv, 1.41 mSv and 2.03 mSv.

The commission ordered the company to immediately recall the products on Monday. Suspecting that the mattresses and pillows contain small amounts of monazite, a radioactive ore, it plans to investigate where the material may have originated from.

“We will work actively with the shopping platforms that sold the Casaon Memotex to minimize customer discomfort,” said a Casamia spokesman. “We are now asking for the cooperation of other shopping channels that may have sold the product.”

The company said it plans to recall all problematic products within a month and is currently checking radon levels on its other products.

In May, Daijin Bed began recalling mattresses after two dozen of its products were found to be tainted with radioactive material.

T&I, a posture-correcting pillow manufacturer, is also currently recalling some products suspected of containing radioactive material.

BY KIM EUN-JIN [kim.eunjin1@joongang.co.kr]