[This is a UK story but. . .]

ET

Chemical peril hidden in homes

A FRONT page in the Daily Mail last week claimed that two scientific studies had found that "gender-bending" chemicals included in many household products were posing a fertility threat to four out of 10 men. The story missed the much wider scandal that, although an ever greater range of manufactured products now include dangerous chemicals, there is no requirement in law for members of the public to be told what they contain.

This astonishing regulatory black hole has only come to light through the persistent researches of Margaret Reichlin, a retired art teacher, who first became aware of the dangers of chemical poisoning when, in 1988, her health was severely damaged by a tributyltin (TBT) wood-preservative used on her Hampshire cottage. It cost £25,000 to detoxify her home and furniture, and she still suffers serious long-term effects to this day.

Miss Reichlin discovered that TBT is so dangerous that its use as a pesticide has been banned for many purposes, such as in anti-fouling paints for boat hulls, which were devastating marine wildlife. In Germany TBT is banned altogether. However there is no bar on its use as a biocide, to kill micro-organisms, in an ever-greater range of household products, such as carpets, shower curtains, shoe soles, even nappies.

Furthermore there is no legal requirement, under the EU law which now governs all safety matters, for toxic chemicals to be identified on product labels, or even for manufacturers to provide data sheets on what their products contain.

After discovering that a duvet she had considered buying was impregnated with TBT, Miss Reichlin embarked on lengthy correspondence with the Department of Trade and Industry, the Health and Safety Executive and the Department of Health. All reassured her that use of dangerous chemicals was fully regulated under various EU directives, such as the Chemical (Hazard Information and Packaging for Supply) Regulations 1994.

But the harder she pressed, the more they were forced to admit that none of these were relevant to her point; and that the only protection the public can hope for lies in the General Product Safety Regulations, which merely lay down that products supplied to the public must be safe.

Thus manufacturers are not obliged to tell the public which toxic chemicals their products may contain; and even if a customer's health is damaged, it would be extremely difficult to establish a link with the product that caused it, since the only source of information is the manufacturer.

Trading standards officials may be happy "to protect consumers" by criminalising shopkeepers for selling apples by the pound, but in health-threatening chemicals they show not the slightest interest.

Last week the shop where Miss Reichlin first saw a TBT-impregnated duvet excitedly told her that the makers had now changed their biocidal ingredient to something called Ultrafresh. Alas, by her tireless researches, Miss Reichlin had already established that Ultrafresh is the trademark for a compound based on TBT.

-- Anonymous, June 30, 2001