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By Dara O'Rourke, November 20, 2008 · Posted under Health Issues

In the last 30 years, we’ve seen a fairly alarming trend of increasing childhood disease rates worldwide. Research in the United States and Europe shows increases in incidences of childhood cancers, as well as increases in attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, early-onset puberty, asthma, and allergies.

There’s also a growing body of scientific studies linking chemicals found in consumer products with specific illnesses (usually studied in animals). And while there is no scientific consensus on the overall causes of these trends, there is enough evidence now to help people buy better products to avoid certain chemicals, until those chemicals are proven safe. This perspective is called the precautionary principle. With babies I think it makes a lot of sense. Rather than requiring that someone (usually an under-funded regulatory agency, or even less-funded non-profit organizations) prove these chemicals definitively cause childhood cancers and other illnesses, we simply say, let’s avoid them until industry provides the data to prove that they are safe.

Based on that idea, many chemicals are now banned in baby care products in Europe and Japan. So when I go shopping for stuff for my five-year-old daughter, I try to avoid these chemicals as well:

Triclosan
Oxybenzone
1,4-Dioxane
Formaldehyde
Phthalates

Cocamide DEA and Lauramide DEA
Propylene Glycol
Talc
Fluoride
Parabens

Read more about the top 10 chemicals to avoid in babycare products after the break.

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By Alastair Iles, November 13, 2008 · Posted under Health Issues

Green chemistry is now a hot topic in California. Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger signed two green chemistry bills in Sacramento on September 29 in an effort to create greener products through the transformation of the state’s regulation of chemicals.

Most immediately relevant to GoodGuide users is SB 509, which Senator Joe Simitian sponsored. Starting in 2009, the California Department for Toxic Substances Control will build an online Toxics Clearinghouse Database with detailed information on chemical hazards to human health and ecosystems. The agency will pool data from existing chemical databases across the world, not just the US. (GoodGuide already uses many of these databases to help generate our health ratings.) This should vastly increase the amount of information that consumers can use to protect themselves.

Unfortunately, the new law does not impose a basic requirement on manufacturers to disclose all ingredients in consumer products, as opposed to reporting only hazardous active ingredients or using vague terms such as “surfactant” or “fragrance”. Nor does the law require the toxics database to address consumer products specifically.

The original bill, in fact, did have such a requirement. Companies were to reveal all substances constituting over 0.1% of a consumer product’s composition on their product labels or websites by March 2009, an effort to help consumers find healthier products. But, in August, Governor Schwarzenegger and the California Legislature succumbed to heavy industry lobbying and abandoned this badly needed reform.

Read more to learn what this lack of reporting means for you.

Professor Alastair Iles is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Environmental Science, Policy, and Management at the University of California, Berkeley. Dr. Iles studies science, technology, and environment, with a focus on how technologies – ranging from chemistry, energy systems, environmental health monitoring, to information technology - affect society and the environment. He received his PhD in Environmental Law and Policy from Harvard University, and previously studied Law at the University of Melbourne, Australia.