Summary: The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) is questioning the safety of antibacterial soaps after decades of use. The concern is that two chemical ingredients interfere with hormones and promote drug-resistant infections.
By Carolyn Buchanan | Posted: December 17, 2013
What's a mother to do? You finally train your tikes to routinely wash their hands to fend off germs and now the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) is telling us to steer clear of certain (and abundantly available) antibacterial soaps. (Kind of makes you want to wash somebody's mouth out with the sudsy stuff.) But before you confuse your family further by making a moratorium on soap use, it's important to understand the particular ingredients to avoid.
Triclosan and triclocarban are the chemicals in question. Originally, they were used in situations that required highly sanitary conditions, like surgeries. In recent years, they've been added to many everyday-use products including soap, wipes, mouthwash, pacifiers, and toothpaste — most of which are branded "antibacterial" or "antimicrobial." The FDA says these substances may be doing more harm than good when used in this everyday way. These chemicals are thought to pose dangers including hormone interference and promoting drug-resistant infections.
Questions were raised about the safety of these products when they first hit the market in the 1970s, but it seems it took a lawsuit filed by the Natural Resource Defense Council to force the FDA to take action.
The FDA has issued a "proposed rule" that requires the manufacturers to prove their products' safety or remove them all together. Before the rule goes into effect, there is a 180-day public discussion period in which any one can submit a formal comment, with a concurrent one-year period for companies to submit new data and information, followed by a 60-day rebuttal comment period. In the meantime, these products will remain on the shelves, and shoppers will have to do their own vetting.
Neither the FDA nor the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) are backing down from the importance of handwashing, though. According to the CDC, "regular handwashing, particularly before and after certain activities, is one of the best ways to remove germs, avoid getting sick, and prevent the spread of germs to others." And if regular soap and clean water are not available, the CDC suggests using an alcohol-based hand sanitizer that contains at least 60-percent alcohol.
Photo Credit: Flickr
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