Chemical in antibacterial soaps produces toxic dioxins
Wednesday, June 16, 2010
by: S. L. Baker, features writer
(NaturalNews) Dioxins are a group of highly toxic compounds that are persistent environmental pollutants. People are exposed to dioxins through the environment and the food chain -- the highest levels of these compounds are found in soils, sediments and food such as dairy products, meat, fish and shellfish. And, according to the World Health Organization (WHO), this exposure can cause reproductive and developmental problems, damage the immune system, interfere with hormones and also cause cancer.（NaturalNews）二噁英是一組高毒性的化合物，是持久性環境污染物。市民接觸二噁英透過環境和食物鏈 - 這些化合物的最高水平被發現在土壤、沉澱物，和食品例如乳製品、肉類、魚類和貝類。此外，根據世界衛生組織（WHO），這種接觸可導致生殖和發育問題，損害免疫系統，干擾荷爾蒙，亦導致癌症。
So you would never flush dioxins into your water supply, right? If you use antibacterial soaps and other antibacterial products, you could be doing the equivalent of just that.
所以你永不把二噁英沖入你的供水，對不？如果您使用抗菌肥皂和其它抗菌產品，你可能做緊剛與那相等的。
In 2003 and 2009, University of Minnesota civil engineering professor William Arnold and his colleague Kristopher McNeill published their discovery that the antibacterial agent triclosan, when exposed to sunlight, generates a specific group of four dioxins. Now, in a new study, a team of scientists from the University of Minnesota's Institute of Technology, Pace Analytical (Minneapolis), the Science Museum of Minnesota and Virginia Tech, have documented how triclosan is transformed into dioxins that are accumulating in the environment. This research, just published in the journal Environmental Science and Technology, concludes dioxins originating from triclosan (found in many hand soaps, deodorants and dishwashing liquids) account for a huge increase in total dioxins now polluting Mississippi River sediments.
在2003年和2009年，明尼蘇達大學土木工程系教授威廉阿諾德，和他的同事克里斯托弗麥克尼爾發表他們的發現，抗菌劑三氯生當暴露在陽光下，產生一特定組的4二噁英。現在，在一項新的研究，來自明尼蘇達大學理工學院、佩斯分析（明尼阿波利斯）、明尼蘇達州和弗吉尼亞理工大學的科學博物館的一隊科學家，已提供文件三氯生如何轉化為二噁英，並在環境中積聚。這項研究剛發表在環境科學與技術雜誌中，結論二噁英源自三氯生（發現在許多洗手肥皂、除臭劑和洗碗碟劑液體中），對現在污染密西西比河沉積物的二噁英總額大幅增加負有責任。
Efforts to cut down on dioxin contamination resulting from industrial pollution have been underway for several decades. However, the issue of triclosan in antibacterial consumer products has been virtually ignored. And the research team has found that over the last 30 years, while levels of all the other dioxins have dropped by 73 to 90 percent, the levels of dioxins derived from the antibacterial soap ingredient triclosan have risen by 200 to 300 percent.
For the new study, which was headed by Jeff Buth, a recent University of Minnesota Ph.D. graduate in chemistry, the researchers examined sediment samples from Lake Pepin, an enlargement of the Mississippi River located 120 miles downstream from the Minneapolis-St. Paul metropolitan area. They analyzed sediment cores (which contain a record of accumulated pollutants in the lake over the past 50 years) and checked for amounts of triclosan, the four dioxins derived from triclosan, and the entire family of dioxin chemicals.
The results? In the most current sediments, triclosan-derived dioxins account for about 30 percent of the total dioxin mass. "These four dioxins only come from triclosan. They didn't exist in Lake Pepin before triclosan was introduced," Dr. Arnold said in a statement to the media.
Triclosan was first added to commercial liquid hand soap in 1987. Four years later, nearly 80 percent of commercial liquid hand soaps contained it, the researchers noted. And what happens to this chemical when people use triclosan-containing products to wash their hands and dishes? About 96 percent of it ends up in residential drains, leading to large loads of triclosan-contaminated water that enters treatment plants.
Unfortunately, triclosan can not be completely removed during the wastewater treatment process. So when treated wastewater is released back into the environment, there's triclosan still in it and sunlight converts some of the triclosan (and related compounds) into dioxins.
That's how the triclosan and dioxins ended up in Lake Pepin sediments, the researchers explained. The chemicals stuck to organic particles in the river and then sank into sediment when they reached the calmer waters of the lake.
In addition to the environmental danger that arises from triclosan's ability to morph into dioxin, the chemical has also been linked to disruptions of hormonal function and may play a role in the evolution of bacterial resistance to antibiotics -- yet the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has done little to address these concerns. In April, the FDA announced it would finally at least study the triclosan situation.
http://www.naturalnews.com/029006_antibacterial_soap_dioxins.html
科學家們說癌症'純是人為的'，在發現埃及木乃伊幾乎沒有一絲疾病遺跡後
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