Asthma and Toxic Domestic Cleaning Products
Growing Evidence
A growing body of evidence suggests a clear correlation between use of toxic cleaning products in the home and the development of asthma in children.
It has long been known that children who grow up without exposure to bacteria tend to have weaker immune systems. However, it has been difficult to establish whether the cleaning agents used to kill bacteria themselves play a direct role in increasing the likelihood of developing asthma, as a range of others factors can influence its onset (e.g. family history, parents who smoke, or the dampness of the home). However, studies are now emerging which have been able to take all of these factors into account and to establish the link definitively.
Recent Research
Most famous and comprehensive is the ALPSAC “Children of the 90s” study, based at the University of Bristol, UK, which surveyed 14,000 pregnant women in 1991–2 and has followed most of them and their children ever since. In one strand of their research, they tracked mothers’ use of household chemicals while they were pregnant and when their children were young. They established that early life exposure to the chemicals contained in household cleaning products produces a 40% increased risk of developing asthma by the age of seven. In the 10% of families who use the chemicals most frequently, the children were twice as likely to suffer wheezing problems as the families where they were used least.
Although it recorded what products the mothers used, the study did not determine the effects of specific chemicals. However, some other recent studies have given a greater insight into this question. A 2008 pan-European study has established, for instance, that those adults who use cleaning sprays at least once per week are 50 percent more likely to have increased asthma symptoms, wheeze, or asthma medication use, within nine years, than those who used such sprays less frequently. The strongest association was found with air fresheners, glass cleaners and furniture-cleaning sprays, which contain VOCs, or volatile organic compounds. These results have been confirmed for children by a recent Australian study, which found that the strongest correlation with increased incidence of asthma among children, among domestic cleaning products, lay with use of VOCs.
Larger Issues
However, as the NHS, in the UK, indicates, many other household cleaning products are also highly toxic and can cause various forms of irritation to skin, eyes and lungs. Indeed, Canadian research has suggested that some cleaning agent ingredients such as denatured ethanol (methylated spirits to you and me) can damage the nervous system. Children are particularly vulnerable to such effects because their lungs, other organs and nervous system, are still developing in interaction with their environment.
Many of these chemicals are used industrially at higher concentrations, where their impact on workers has been tested and frequently exposed as highly damaging over time. However, little or no testing has been done on their impact at the lower concentrations found in household products. And more than 1000 new chemicals are introduced every year, whose long-term effects are almost entirely unknown.
This growing body of evidence makes a strong case for seeking out non-toxic domestic cleaning products which will protect children from asthma and other illnesses.