Clean Home, Healthy Family? How To Make Sure One Leads To The OtherWritten by Vincent Platania
It is estimated that U.S. Poison Control Center sees nearly 1.5 million cases of accidental ingestion of poisons every year. It is sad but true that most of these accidental poisonings happen to children under 12 years of age. Most of us are concerned about keeping our homes clean and our families healthy. We all want our living space to be clean and germ free, because we believe this will help keep our family safe from disease. It is true that cutting down on germs will help any family stay healthier, but we also need to be concerned about how we are getting rid of those germs, and if cleaning products we are using are even more dangerous to our health. The above number represents a sad statistic, but it gives any parent reason to be concerned. We can lock up cupboards, put dangers out of reach, and do a lot of other things to make our homes "kid-safe," but no matter what we do, accidents are bound to happen. If your home is pretty typical of modern household, you already have dozens of cleaning solutions and personal care products that contain harmful, even fatal chemicals. Recent studies have shown that most households contain more than 63 hazardous cleaning products. All told, that amounts to hundreds of dangerous chemicals. The truth is that most household cleaners contain very dangerous chemicals that can irritate skin, cause problems in breathing, do harm to fabrics and other surfaces, catch fire easily, and even poison us, our pets, or our kids. In fact, chemicals most cleaning products contain have potential to severely harm or even kill your kids, your family pets, and you. In using these products, we need to exercise utmost in caution to ensure proper use and safe storage. For certain safety and their own peace of mind, many consumers choose to simply avoid these potentially hazardous formulas in favor of non-toxic, environmentally-friendly cleaning solutions. This not only ensures that no accidental poisonings or other hazards occur, but is just a wise thing to do for our families' health.
| | What You Don't Know Can Harm You: Know Your Cleaners Before You BuyWritten by Vincent Platania
The next time you visit your supermarket or neighborhood retailer, take a quick walk down household cleaning isle. Take just a few seconds to notice smell, then move on. If you've already noticed smell, have you ever wondered if breathing that in might be harmful to your health? Well, that "clean-smelling" odor you detect all way down cleaner isle is caused by something industry experts have termed "out gassing." Out gassing is process by which those chemical vapors escape from containers as they sit store shelves. And, just breathing them can be extremely hazardous. As you may know, inhalation (or breathing) is one of three major ways that harmful chemicals can enter your body. The other two ways include ingestion (or swallowing) and absorption through skin. Inhalation is even more dangerous than actually ingesting a chemical, because harmful agents go directly into blood stream to affect lungs, heart, brain, liver, and kidneys. It happens almost instantly. These chemically-based cleaners may get cleaning job done, but vapors can enter your system and start doing their damage before you even realize what's happening. Now let's talk about absorption. One square centimeter of your skin contains millions of cells and nerve endings. This is why we're seeing advertisements for anti-smoking or weight-loss patches. They work because ingredients enter your body easily through skin. Unfortunately, same applies to chemicals. Every time a cleaning product or other chemical touches your skin, it gets absorbed. Washing your hands after using such cleaners cannot prevent some level of absorption. In fact, even days after you've cleaned a surface, touching it, preparing food on it, or even walking across it can result in harmful chemicals being absorbed into your body. The third way harmful agents can enter your body is most obvious: ingestion. If you swallow something, it will eventually get into your blood stream and affect your internal organs.
|
