Some boxes of crayons and children's toys for sale in the US contained traces of asbestos, a substance long known as a carcinogen and capable of causing fatal lung disease.
Don't store avocado like this: it's dangerous
Some boxes of crayons and toys for children on sale in the US contained traces of asbestos, a substance long known as a carcinogen and as capable of causing fatal lung disease.
We would never want children to use products containing dangerous substances, but this could still happen without our knowledge. The presence of asbestos was found in a recent study of 28 types of crayons and 21 toy fingerprint kits.
Tests confirmed the presence of traces of asbestos in these baby products. Although in the United States asbestos is identified as a carcinogenic and dangerous substance, its use is not prohibited, although this material is still implicated in the deaths of 15 US citizens every year.
We certainly would never expect to find a carcinogen such as asbestos in commonly used products intended for children. But that's what an investigation conducted by the EWG Action Fund identified. One wonders why asbestos is present in toys and children's products when the connection between asbestos and cancer has been known for decades.
THEEWG Action Fund, partner organization ofEnvironmental working group, analyzed crayons and fingerprint kits for sale in US and online chain stores and commissioned the tests to specialized laboratories. Out of the total of products analyzed, 4 brands of wax crayons e 2 fingerprint kits are results contaminated with asbestos. It was about products made in China and imported to the United States.
According to experts, the composition of pastels puts children at risk from the point of view of inhalation of microscopic asbestos fibers: a pastel could contain 1 million or more.
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These are the 4 crayon marks in which traces of asbestos were found: Amscan Crayons, Disney Mickey Mouse Clubhouse, Nickelodeon Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle Crayons e Saban’s Power Rangers Super Megaforce.
The asbestos contamination then covered the following 2 fingerprint kits for sale as children's toys: EduScience Deluxe Forensics Lab Kit and Inside Intelligence Secret Spy Kit.
The presence of asbestos in these baby products is probably due to one contamination of talc used both as a binder in crayons and as a powder ingredient in fingerprint kits. This is a fairly common occurrence, as talc and asbestos would often be found in the same geological formations.
Similar problems had already been noted in 2000 with regard to crayons and in 2007 with fingerprint kits, but the Consumer Product Safety Commission it did not ban or set limits for the presence of asbestos in crayons, toys and other baby products.
There is therefore one serious regulatory gap. In an attempt to resolve the issue, one was born in the United States petition of the Environmental Working Group which asks stores to ban the sale of contaminated products. For sign the petition e deepen the topic you can visit the website of Asbestos Nation.
Marta Albè
Photo source: wikimedia.org
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