Protect your family from dangerous health care products!

Find the safest products now

I hate to sound alarmist, but the statistics are frightening. According to an independent non-profit research organization, Environmental Working Group and reported in the March/April 2006 issue of Mothering Magazine, almost all personal care products - soaps, lotions, toothpaste, deoderant, cosmetics - are created from industrial chemicals and contain either known carcinogens, pesticides, reproductive toxins, endocrine disruptors, and other harmful substances, or simply substances that we have not adequately researched.

For example: Johnson & Johnson's Baby Softwash Body Wash has 15 ingredients that raise health concerns, including cancer hazards, reproductive toxicity, endocrine disruptors, irritants and toxic chemicals. (For details, click here.)

Here's what we do know:

• One third of all personal care products sold in America have known carcinogens.
  
  
• Small children are ten times more sensitive to most chemicals than are adults, according the EPA. Private research indicates children may actually be sixty times more sensitive!
  
  
• Fifty-seven percent of all products contain "penetration enhancer" chemicals that can drive other ingredients faster and deeper into the skin to the blood vessels below.
  
  
• Scientists have linked chemicals called phthalates - found in baby chew toys, nail polish, hairspray, and the fragrances that scent almost all products - to defects in male reproductive development and premature breast development in girls.
  
  
• "Fragrance" mixtures, exempt from product labeling laws, can comprise hundreds of individual ingredients, and are common human allergens. A recent survey found that up to one of every 50 people suffer immune system damage from fragrance exposures.
  
  
• Baby powder, if inhaled in large quantities, can cause serious long-term damage to lungs, the FDA believes. What amount of exposure is safe?
  
  
• The average American adult uses 9 personal care products each day, with 126 unique chemical ingredients.
  
  
• Only eleven percent of the 10,500 ingredients that the FDA has determined are used in personal care products have been evaluated for safety by the CIR, the FDA, or any other publicly accountable institution. Impurities are legal and unrestricted for the personal care product industry.
  
  
• Only one percent of products have had all of their ingredients screened by the cosmetics industry or FDA.
  
  

The Campaign for Safe Cosmetics is a coalition of public health, educational, religious, labor, womens, environmental and consumer groups. Their goal is to protect the health of consumers and workers by requiring the health and beauty industry to phase out the use of chemicals linked to cancer, birth defects and other health problems and replace them with safer alternatives.

They are asking cosmetics and personal care products companies to sign the Compact for Safe Cosmetics, a pledge to remove toxic chemicals and replace them with safer alternatives in every market they serve. (View the list of companies that have signed so far here.)

A related non-profit research organization, the Environmental Working Group offers a comprehensive online searching tool to learn about specific products and ingredients.

Merrybaby has used this tool to compile a list of the safest baby and personal care products.