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Impact of Cleaning Products on Women's Lungs as Damaging as 20-a-Day Cigarette Habit: Study
Regular use of cleaning sprays can have as much of an impact on health as smoking a pack of cigarettes a day, according to a new study. Scientists at Norway's University of Bergen tracked 6,000 people, with an average age of 34 at the time of enrolement in the study, who used the products over a period of two decades, according to the research published in the American Thoracic Society's American Journal of Respiratory and Critical Care Medicine [open, DOI: 10.1164/rccm.201706-1311OC] [DX].
They found that lung function decline in women regularly using the products, such as cleaners, was equivalent over the period to those with a 20 cigarettes a day smoking habit. [...] The experts attribute the decline in lung function to the damage that cleaning agents cause to the mucous membranes lining the airways, resulting over time in persistent changes.
The results follow a study by French scientists in September 2017 that found nurses who used disinfectants to clean surfaces at least once a week had a 24 percent to 32 percent increased risk of developing lung disease.
(Score: 2) by sjames on Wednesday February 21 2018, @01:04AM (3 children)
The whole radiation thing is all over the place. Yes, the radium girls was a terrible case of employer negligence. The so-called health products were quackery at it's finest. The only saving grace there is that most of the "radium" products "for health" also fraudulently contained no radium. However, in spite of radium watch dials being so popular for many years, I am unaware of any evidence of elevated cancer rates on men's left wrists. Likewise, no elevated rates of cancer of the feet for people who were children when fluoroscopes were popular for fitting children's shoes.
At the same time as the radiation paranoia, household cleaners and personal scents have gotten an unwarranted free pass. Perhaps least excusable are the "masking agents" that "eliminate" bad odors by deadening the nerves in the olfactory bulb which is fairly closely connected to the brain.
(Score: 2) by legont on Wednesday February 21 2018, @03:31AM
The Radium Girls were instructed to "point" their brushes on their lips to save time while men at the factory used lead enforced protection. Than employers claimed that girls died of syphilis. That's murder - pure and simple.
"Wealth is the relentless enemy of understanding" - John Kenneth Galbraith.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday February 21 2018, @07:37AM (1 child)
Except Fabreeze doesn't work like that at all ;) It's masking by hiding smelly molecule inside a bigger, neutral, non-smelly molecule. Basically, it puts smells in the box.
And they are talking about "cleaning" in general terms which doesn't even imply using aerosols.
I wonder if "cleaning at home" also implies less physical activity. Occupational cleaners had much lower incidence, which seems ass-backwards. This may be one of these studies that correlation doesn't imply causation as the only correlation seems to be high smoking rates and lung disease.
(Score: 2) by sjames on Wednesday February 21 2018, @05:01PM
But many masking agents do. Those are often put in household cleaners and detergents to deaden the perceived smell. Those are usually called "scent" in the ingredients since neurotoxin might be off-putting.