Triclosan Banned!!

Since finishing my treatment in February 2013 and embarking on the cancer survivor right of passage that is known as "review all the chemicals that are in your life and try to see if they are the source of what just happened to me" I have been avoiding Triclosan. Triclosan has been in antibacterial soap and even toothpastes. Triclosan can potentially create super bacteria and is a known endocrine disruptor. As someone who just took an endocrine disruptor on purpose (my tamoxifen) I would like to put only the ones my doctor prescribes into my body.

Guess who finally got on board that Triclosan shouldn't be allowed in consumer products? The federal government. Yesterday, the FDA banned triclosan and 18 other specific ingredients because they were not any more effective than plain soap and water.

In the press release the FDA, the mention that the data when these chemicals were studied may demonstrate that the do harm. Here is a direct quote.

Consumers may think antibacterial washes are more effective at preventing the spread of germs, but we have no scientific evidence that they are any better than plain soap and water,” said Janet Woodcock, M.D., director of the FDA’s Center for Drug Evaluation and Research (CDER). “In fact, some data suggests that antibacterial ingredients may do more harm than good over the long-term.

 Another case of more is not always better. This may have been 3 years later than most consumer protection agencies would have liked, but the FDA finally got there and it means a lot less people exposed to an endocrine disruptor. Companies have 1 year to get triclosan and the 18 other ingredients out of their products, but by 2018 antibacterial soap should be thing of the past and that makes me happy.