When Soups Attack!

Instant cups of soup — the kind that often come in a Styrofoam cup full of noodles — send children to the hospital every day.

“I don’t have them in my house,” says Dr. Warren Garner, director of the burn unit at University of Southern California’s County Hospital in Los Angeles. “I would say that we see at least two to three patients a week who’ve been injured by these products.”

These soups are dangerous because of the way the cups are designed. The cups are tall, lightweight, and have an unstable base that makes them tip over easily.

NPR’s Planet Money has the whole story, including a tippiness chart.