Though Japanese airbag manufacturer Takata Corp. has refused to heed the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration’s (NHTSA) demand to issue a nationwide recall of its air bags, some American automakers are acting on their own.

Toyota Motor Corp is recalling 57,000 vehicles worldwide due to the problems with the Takata airbags, which reportedly are prone to explode in humid conditions, spraying metal shrapnel throughout the vehicle.

According to Reuters, more than 20 million vehicles with Takata airbags have been recalled globally because of the defect. In addition to Toyota, Nissan, Mitsubishi and Honda — Takata’s biggest customer — have all issued recalls.

Most of the Takata recalls have taken place in the past year, but according to airbag lawsuits, many automakers allegedly knew of the problem as early as 2008, when Honda first notified regulators of a problem with its Takata airbags. Instead, the automakers and Takata opted to not address the issue, leading to deaths stemming from the defect, court documents said.

Honda Motor Co. is recalling some 400,000 vehicles globally, including about 177,000 in Japan.

Toyota, which says it is not aware of any injuries or death related to the recall, is recalling some models made between December 2002 and March 2004. About 40,000 are in Japan, 6,000 in Europe and the rest in other markets outside North America. None of the recalls are in the United States.

Daihatsu Motor Co., Toyota’s small car subsidiary, recalled more than 27,000 vehicles in Japan that were manufactured between December 2002 and May 2003, bringing the total number of vehicles recalled so far in Japan to 2.6 million.

In mid-November, the NHTSA announced that it was calling for a national recall of vehicles with driver’s side frontal air bags made by Takata.

The federal agency also issued a General Order to Takata and all 10 of the vehicle manufacturers that use Takata airbag inflators — BMW, Chrysler, Ford, General Motors, Honda, Mazda, Mitsubishi, Nissan, Subaru, and Toyota — requiring each manufacturer to file, under oath, a detailed report and produce all related documents about completed, ongoing or planned testing of Takata inflators outside the current regional recall areas.

“The agency is demanding this information to compel Takata and the affected industry to be frank with not only NHTSA, but the American public, as to what testing and additional steps they have done and plan to do to control and mitigate the risk associated with Takata’s defective inflators,” a statement reads.

Takata Corp. has rejected the NHSTA’s demand Wednesday for a nationwide recall “setting up a possible legal showdown and leaving some drivers to wonder about the safety of their cars,” according to the Associated Press. Honda Motor Co. is the only automaker thus far that has recalled cars with Takata airbags in all 50 states. Other automakers have not announced a decision.

The airbag recalls have mostly been limited to hot and humid places like Florida and Hawaii, where most of the exploding airbags have been reported, the Detroit News reported, though Honda Motor Co. has expanded their recall to cars with Takata airbags in all 50 states.

Hiroshi Shimizu, Takata’s senior vice president of global quality assurance, told a House subcommittee Dec. 3 that the scientific evidence “doesn’t support a change from regional recall to national recall.”