The US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has reached agreement with consumer chemicals producer Reckitt Benckiser to cancel 12 d-CON mouse and rat poison products that no longer comply with EPA safety standards.

Before EPA tightened the standards for household rat and mouse poison products, more than 10,000 children a year were accidentally exposed, the agency said. Since the new standard took effect, the number has decreased.

Reckitt Benckiser has agreed to stop production by the end of 2014 and end distribution to retailers by March 31, 2015. The new standards require consumer mouse and rat poison products to be housed in protective bait stations.

Pellets and other bait forms that cannot be secured in bait stations are prohibited by the FDA, which also prohibits the sale of products containing brodifacoum, bromadiolone, difethialone and difenacoum to residential consumers because of their greater risk to wildlife.