DailyDirt: How Clean Is Your Soap?

from the urls-we-dig-up dept

Soap has saved countless lives by preventing the spread of disease and reducing the number of disease-causing microbes in our world. But we've become a bit too focused on killing germs with soap, and we might want to cut back a bit on the over-use of antimicrobial agents. The human microbiome is changing according to our habits and environment, and it might only take a few soapy showers to kill off a healthy microflora balance.

• No matter how obsessive you are about cleaning your hands, you can't get rid of ALL the germs. Soap itself contains live bacteria. It's rare to get infected by soaps and other hygiene products because manufacturers follow FDA guidelines for maximum bacteria content, but even soap can go bad with time. [url]
• Maybe there's an extreme of using too much soap and killing off the "good bacteria" on your skin. But would you consider using a probiotic lotion/treatment on your skin and skip showering? The inventor of a "skin tonic" hasn't showered in 12 years. The skin microbiome isn't well understood, but maybe "microbiomics" will help treat eczema or other skin problems -- and decrease the use of soap products. [url]
• Antibacterial soaps with triclosan are being phased out as manufacturers find out about how widespread triclosan is becoming in the environment -- and in people's bodies. Soap without antimicrobial agents works, but the ubiquity of triclosan and other antimicrobials can make it inconvenient to stop using it. [url]

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Filed Under: antibacterial, antibiotics, antimicrobial, germs, microbes, microbiome, microbiomics, microflora, probiotic, soap, triclosan

DailyDirt: It's The Little Things That Matter...

from the urls-we-dig-up dept

Adding a little bit of something can make a huge difference. For example, some carbon and a few other trace metals added to iron can make a steel stronger and stainless. Nanotechnology promises to improve a bunch of things with very small changes to the surfaces of common materials. But these small changes could also cause some big problems. Here are just a few links on some small ingredients that might not be so great for the environment.

• In case you hadn't heard, Minnesota has passed a law against antibacterial soaps containing triclosan. The law won't go into effect until 2017, so the big soap makers have some time to try to fight the ban or figure out how to sell regular old soap now that they've flooded the market with soaps that tell consumers that old soap formulas are more germy. [url]
• Illinois has banned microbeads in soaps and body washes. This law also won't go into effect for a few years, but the tiny plastic beads are already turning up in the Great Lakes and in various waterways. [url]
• If you don't like the idea of nano-sized particles of titanium dioxide in food, you should look at your dairy products a bit more closely. The FDA is looking into regulating nano-sized particles, but some commercial products may already contain them. [url]

If you'd like to read more awesome and interesting stuff, check out this unrelated (but not entirely random!) Techdirt post via StumbleUpon.

Filed Under: antibacterial, environment, fda, microbeads, nanotechnology, soap, titanium dioxide, triclosan