Is Your Home Safe for Children?

You want to provide a clean home for your children.  You use cleaning products that promise all kinds of benefits like killing 99.9% of all germs while making your home smell like a tropical jungle.  All surfaces will sparkle, your kids' clothes will be ultra-clean, spot-free, and fragrant.  It sounds great, but is it really? 

Most common household cleaners are harsh.  They can cause all kinds of problems: laundry detergents can cause skin irritation; cleaning product fumes can cause indoor air pollution which can cause airway problems and irritate eyes; the chemicals that make the lovely fragrances have possible links to disrupted hormone levels; and some cleaning products can kill you or your child if used improperly.

Chemical companies are not required to include all ingredients on their cleaning product or air "freshening" labels, and most products have not been thoroughly tested for human health impacts.  However, there are words to look for:  "Caution," "Warning," "Danger," "Poison," and "Keep away from children and pets."

In addition to the indirect dangers of cleaners, many children have been poisoned by sampling these products.  In 2010, U.S. poison centers answered nearly 2.4 million calls about human exposures to poisons.  In children, about 40% of poisonings involve medicines; the other 60% involve products such as plants, cleaning supplies, cosmetics, pesticides, paints, and solvents.  Poisoning is the fourth leading cause of death among children with peak incidences in children between the ages of one and three.  About half of all poison exposures occur to children under the age of six.

According to the Center for Disease Control, every day, over 300 children in the United States ages 0 to 19 are treated in an emergency department, and two children die, as a result of being poisoned. It’s not just chemicals in your home marked with clear warning labels that can be dangerous to children.   It includes the everyday toxic products we purchase and don't think of as hazardous such as cleaning supplies

What Can You Do?

Make sure your cleaning products and other poisons are not accessible to your child.  REMEMBER, many poisonings occur when a product is in use and the parent is occupied with cleaning or when the parent is cooking a meal.

Switch your cleaning products to low or nontoxic cleaners.  There are many cleaners on the market that are much safer--however, beware of "greenwashing" of products.  Some companies use words like "natural" and "nontoxic," but do not prove it on their labels.  Make sure the product states that all ingredients are listed, and you understand what those ingredients are.

These products are pricier, but they may be worth it to a busy parent.  You may want to consider making your own, simple cleaning products with white vinegar, baking soda, and liquid soap (see the Recipes page on this blog).  They take just minutes to make.

When You Have Hazardous Products In Your Home

The Center for Disease Control suggests:

Lock them up. Keep medicines and toxic products, such cleaning solutions, in their original packaging where children can’t see or get them.

Know the number. Put the nationwide poison control center phone number, 1-800-222-1222, on or near every telephone in your home and program it into your cell phone. Call the poison control center if you think a child has been poisoned but they are awake and alert; they can be reached 24 hours a day, seven days a week. Call 911 if you have a poison emergency and your child has collapsed or is not breathing.

Read the label. Follow label directions and read all warnings when giving medicines to children.

Don’t keep it if you don’t need it. Safely dispose of unused, unneeded, or expired prescription drugs and over the counter drugs, vitamins, and supplements. To dispose of medicines, mix them with coffee grounds or kitty litter and throw them away. You can also turn them in at a local take-back program or during National Drug Take-Back events.

Note, these national programs will probably disappear when the federal government finds a better solution--which I hope will be soon.  Never pour medicines down the drain or flush them down the toilet.  They end up in our drinking water as treatment facilities and septic systems do not remove them.

There may also be a household hazardous waste collection in your area for the toxic products you have in your home if you're not going to use them.  Call your town or the solid waste management district to find out.

The Family Camp & Greenwashing

Grammy & Grampa taking a break while building our camp

Today, my family met out at our lakeside camp in New Hampshire.  My grandparents built the camp in the 1950s.  Some of the lumber used to build the camp was made at my father's sawmill.  When my grandparents died, my parents bought the camp and later deeded it to my siblings and me.  It's a spectacular place right on the lake with a mountain and lots of conserved land on the other side of the lake.  This year there are two baby loons, and we heard the loons calling on and off all day.

The lake is precious to us, and we want to protect it and keep it clean.  But somehow toxic products pop up at our camp every year--potential threats to the cleanliness of the water--not to mention our own bodies.  Septic systems (and sewage treatment plants) are not designed to remove all toxins.  So these chemicals can end up in our water supplies.  Lakefront properties are more likely to pollute as there is a shorter distance from leach fields to water.  And old camps are notorious for having archaic septic systems such as holding tanks that can overflow, or even an old car body for the septic tank--really!

We were gathered on this gorgeous day at the camp to clean it and do repair work before my cousins arrive for a visit.  My mother was cleaning with a commercial cleaner that stunk up the camp.  She taught me to clean with vinegar and yet there she is with a toxic, pine-perfumed cleaner she'd found under the sink going at all the kitchen cabinets.  I acted indignant which did not help (I regress about 30 years in her presence), and I stayed outside weeding until she was finished.  There was also white vinegar which I mixed with water and used to clean walls, floors, and windows.

Poster Product for "Greenwashing"

When I looked under the sink, all kinds of toxic products had grown there since last year.  This included fabric deodorizers, furniture polish, chlorine, and ammonia.  All unnecessary in my opinion since there are nontoxic alternatives (see recipes page).   Another product under the sink was "Simple Green All-Purpose Cleaner."  I think of this product as the poster product for "greenwashing."  Doesn't this name sound wonderful?  "Simple" implies that there are very few ingredients so it should be good for the environment.  And the word "green," well, nuf said.  They do not list their ingredients on the label, but it does say, "Non-Toxic" and it has the Good Housekeeping seal which provides a warranty for effectiveness, not safety.

I looked up the MSDS (materials safety data sheet) for Simple Green and found it is mostly water with other ingredients of 2-butoxyethanol, ethoxylated alcohol, tetrapotassium pyrophosphate, sodium citrate, fragrance, colorant.  There's nothing simple or green about this product which is labeled as "non-toxic." 

I'll just stick to the first ingredient after water--which is plentiful fodder for this discussion as you'll see.  The ingredient 2-butoxyethanol has several other names including butyl cellosolve.  Many products use this chemical including glass cleaners.  The U.S. Department of Labor, Occupational Safety & Health Administration states that 2-butoxyethanol exposure can produce a variety of symptoms, health effects, and can affect eyes, skin, respiratory system, the central nervous systems, hematopoietic system (production of blood), blood, kidneys, liver, and lymphoid system.  I know there may be a relatively small amount of this chemical in Simple Green, but I don't know at what point it will affect me.  And if I am exposed to a bunch of other cleaners with similar or reactive ingredients, my chances of becoming ill from exposure increase.

"Greenwashing" is defined as a company spending lots of money on advertising and trying to convince us that a product is green, while they spend very few resources on trying to actually be green.

A 2010 Greenwashing Report by TerraChoice states that more than 95% of consumer products claiming to be green were found to commit "greenwashing."  Products that are tested and certified by a reliable third-party such as EcoLogo and Green Seal, make it easier to know which products are safe for you.  Careful, however, as it is possible to actually buy a "green-sounding seal" on-line for as little as 15 bucks.  How about "Green as a Frog" seal, "Pure as the Driven Snow," seal or "Sunshine in a Bottle" seal?  We could make up all kinds of catchy names for a seal that sound environmentally friendly, but don't mean a thing!  When a reputable seal is not available on a product, note if they provide a list of all ingredients--they'll tell you if it's a complete list if they have nothing to hide.  You can also check out the National Institutes of Health Household Products Database.  And of course, you can search for the MSDS on line to see for yourself what ingredients are in the product.  Can't pronounce an ingredient?  Don't buy the product unless it explains what it is and it sounds safe.

Check out the recipes page on this site to find recipes for nontoxic cleaners made with simple, green ingredients that work and won't kill you.   Vinegar, baking soda, and glycerine soap just aren't that scary! 

Next time I go out to camp, I won't be cleaning, I'll be swimming, canoeing, or just sitting on the deck enjoying the sounds and view.