Phthalate plastics?

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CNN reported today findings from the CDC admitting that Americans carry "larger than expected" amounts of a chemical called phthalate in their body tissues. This was determined from examination of urine, blood and hair specimens. The press release stated this chemical is used in soap, cosmetics, shampoo, and "flexible plastics". What would be included in the category "flexible plastics"?

-- Deborah Lawton (jlawton@kaltelnet.net), March 22, 2001

Answers

Latex products?

-- Lynn Goltz (lynngoltz@aol.com), March 23, 2001.

I think that latex would be a rubber compound, where flexible plastics would be more like plastic wrap, snap shut bags, perhaps sealable plastic ware containers. Whew! It's hard to mention products without mentioning brand names.

The Centers for Disease Control has a web site at http://www.cdc.gov which may explain the story more. I havent' checked yet. The web site also tells of all those rumors and hoaxes that involve health. So it is a good place to check when a horrible story arrives in the ol' email.

-- Notforprint (Not@thekeyboard.com), March 23, 2001.


There are two classes of latex. A natural plant based material and more commonally synthetic polymers based on butadiene, styrene, vinyl acetate, or acrylic monomers.

-- Lynn Goltz (lynngoltz@aol.com), March 23, 2001.

I come to this site everyday to learn something and I did learn about latex compounds today. Yup, you are indeed right. My dictionary tells me that as well, now that I've consulted it.

Now that it has been said, what are latex balloons made out of? When they talk about people having latex allergies, to which are they speaking of? Hm, this posses more questions for me than it answers.

-- Notforprint (Not@thekeyboard.com), March 24, 2001.


There was a big ruckus about this a few years back, because it became clearly obvious that a major use of flexible plastics were baby toys, pacifiers, and other infant teething things. Just what you want Jr. sucking on, eh?

-- Soni (thomkilroy@hotmail.com), March 25, 2001.


Latex balloons - depends on the company. However, I believe that as of recently, most are plant=based.

Allergies can be to either, but the now-common 'chemical' allergies are to the synthetics.

Also in the flexible plastics category are the muffin tins from store bakeries, soda and water bottles, etc. this would include the plastic milk containers, although I think that there are seperate rules for those....

-- Sue Diederich (willow666@rocketmail.com), March 26, 2001.


BALLOONS: From The Book of Firsts by Patrick Robertson, Bramhall House, NY, 1978: The first rubber balloons were made by Professor Michael Faraday in 1824 for use in his experiments with hydrogen at the Royal Institution in London. `The caoutchouc is exceedingly elastic', he wrote in the Quarterly Journal of Science the same year. `Bags made of it...have been expanded by having air forced into them, until the caoutchouc was quite transparent, and when expanded by hydrogen they were so light as to form balloons with considerable ascending power....' Faraday made his balloons by cutting round two sheets of rubber laid together and pressing the edges together. The tacky rubber welded automatically, and the inside of the balloon was rubbed with flour to prevent the opposing surfaces joining together. Toy balloons were introduced by pioneer rubber manufacturer Thomas Hancock the following year in the form of a do-it-yourself kit consisting of a bottle of rubber solution and a condensing syringe.

Vulcanized toy balloons, which unlike the earlier kind were unaffected by changes in temperature, were first manufactured by J.G. Ingram of London in 1847 and can be regarded as the prototype of modern toy balloons."

The natural rubber latex that we use comes from the sap of the rubber tree , Heveabrasiliensis, that grows in Malaysia. This sap looks like milk and is shipped to America in large ocean tanker ships. Once removed from the tree, the sap is called latex. To make this suitable for balloon production, curing agents, accelerators, oil, color, and water must be added. After these are added, the completed latex is put in an open top tank, and the balloon form, which is in the shape of a balloon, is dipped. Before the form is dipped into latex, it is dipped into a coagulent that causes the rubber particles of the latex to collect on the form. This coagulent is calcium nitrate, water, and/or alcohol. After the coagulent coated form is dried, it is then dipped into the compounded latex. Then the latex coated form passed through a set of revolving brushes that rolls the balloon neck into the bead that is used to aid in the inflation of the balloon. The latex coated form is then washed in hot water to remove any unused nitrate. Following the leaching, the form is put in a 200-220 degrees Fahrenheit oven to cure for 20-25 minutes. When cured, the rubber balloon is removed from the form (stripped).

-- Lynn Goltz (lynngoltz@aol.com), March 26, 2001.


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