A mum says her 4-year-old son ate magnets that he "mistook for sprinkles" when they fell out from his Temu toy - forcing doctors to remove his bowel in order to fish them out. Kaela Modery bought her son Gage a set of magnetic building blocks from the retail giant last month. But the 28-year-old claims the exterior parts of the "fragile" toy kept "popping off" while her son was playing with it, leaving the inner magnets exposed.
Days later, little Gage began unexpectedly vomiting and complaining of stomach pains. It was only when Kaela was tidying her son's room that she found a half-eaten cookie under his bed covered in the small and slim magnets, which she says he had mistaken for sprinkles.
Horrified, the mum-of-four rushed Gage to hospital where an x-ray revealed he had swallowed seven of the toy magnets and required emergency surgery. During the operation, doctors had to temporarily remove Gage's entire bowel to hunt for the magnets, which had fused his left and right colon together.
Thankfully the bowel was put back in but his mum says doctors are unsure of the long-term impact and that he could have died had they perforated his bowel. Luckily, Gage made a full recovery but nursing assistant Kaela is now calling on Temu to take urgent action over the 'unsafe' product.
Kaela, who lives in Millinocket, Maine, US, said: "For Christmas, I purchased some magnetic building blocks for my son. When I got them I noticed they were quite fragile but by looking at the reviews, this seemed quite normal. He loved playing with them. As the days went on, I noticed the covers kept popping off but I didn't think anything about the magnets. I threw the broken ones away.
