Work Are Flame Retardant Clothes Harmful To People’S Health

Flame retardants threaten the health and may potentially do more harm than good in a fire. Not all flame retardants are harmful, but some, including organophosphates, are known to cause adverse health effects, with human and animal studies linking them to cancer, hormonal changes, and fertility problems. A British study of the American Chemical Society (ACS) showed that flame retardants increase the danger of invisible toxic gases, the leading cause of death in fires. Young children are particularly susceptible to the toxicity of flame retardant chemicals. They can ingest significantly more of these chemicals than adults because they crawl around on floors, then put their hands and other objects into their mouths.

Although flame retardants can offer benefits when added to some products, a growing body of evidence shows that many of these chemicals are associated with adverse health effects in animals and humans. These include:

• Endocrine and thyroid disruption
• Impacts on the immune system
• Reproductive toxicity
• Cancer
• Adverse effects on fetal and child development
• Neurologic function

A new study has found that flame retardants—used in everything from furniture to baby toys—are increasingly showing up in people’s bodies, raising potential health concerns. What’s more, flame retardants known collectively as “Tris” are used in baby products, furniture, automotive foam cushioning, strollers, nursing pillows, televisions, computers, adhesives, upholstery, carpets backing, rubber, plastics, paints, and varnishes. They have been linked to cancer and can harm the liver, kidney, brain, and testes.

If you closely examine your living room couch, your favorite easy chair, or your child’s car seat, the odds are strong that you will find upholstery that is filled with polyurethane foam treated with a chemical flame retardant. Some may find that comforting: Isn’t it desirable to hold an accidental fire at bay, one caused by, say, a burning cigarette or faulty electrical wiring? But studies show that many flame-resistant chemicals loom as potential health menaces, associated with cancers, memory loss, lower I.Q.s and impaired motor skills in children, to name a few woes. Isn’t it just as desirable, some would also say, to keep such substances out of people’s lives?

Concerns about the chemicals’ health effects continued to grow. This is due to the fact that the retardants do not form a chemical link with the foam. As a result, they don’t fit well into cushions and mattresses. They are able to flee into the surroundings. When a person sits on a couch, chemically contaminated air is ejected from the upholstery. These pollutants settle on household dust, travel outside, and even make their way into rivers and breast milk. Small children, who are prone to putting nearly everything in their mouths, are especially vulnerable since they play on floors covered in chemically tainted dust. Flame retardants can enter the body through a variety of routes, including diet, consumer products in the home, cars, planes, the workplace, and house dust.

• During the manufacturing process, these chemicals can contaminate the air, water, and soil.
• Chemicals from products can leak into dust and the air.
• Dust can get on your hands and food, then into your mouth when you eat it.
• Through e-waste, which is defined as the uncontrolled burning and disassembling of electronic and electrical garbage.

Over the past 40 years, a class of chemicals with the tongue-twisting name of halogenated flame retardants has permeated people’s lives throughout the industrialized world. These synthetic chemicals — used in electronics, upholstery, carpets, textiles, insulation, vehicle and airplane parts, children’s clothes and strollers, and many other products — have proven very effective at making petroleum-based materials resist fire.

Yet many of these compounds have also turned out to be environmentally mobile and persistent — turning up in food and household dust — and are now so ubiquitous that levels of the chemicals in the blood of North Americans appear to have been doubling every two to five years for the past several decades.

Acting on growing evidence that these flame retardants can accumulate in people and cause adverse health effects — interfering with hormones, reproductive systems, thyroid, and metabolic function, and neurological development in infants and children — the federal government and various states have limited or banned the use of some of these chemicals, as have other countries. Several are restricted by the Stockholm Convention on persistent organic pollutants. Many individual companies have voluntarily discontinued the production and use of these compounds.

Yet despite these restrictions, evidence has emerged in recent months that efforts to curtail the use of such flame retardants — a $4 billion-a-year industry globally — and limit their impacts on human health may not succeed.

Five ways F.R. clothing is improperly worn:

1. Wearing it with a non-FR outer layer: It may be tempting to wear a non-FR jacket over your regular FR clothing in bad weather. Even if you wear flame-resistant clothing, a nonFR outer layer can still ignite and burn, putting you in danger. When faced with cold-weather conditions, it is essential to invest in the proper F.R. outerwear.
2. Wearing it with a non-FR synthetic under-layer: Performance T-shirts made from polyester or other synthetic materials are often worn to help with moisture management, but they are not flame resistant and can melt to the skin. Ideally, the underlayer would be F.R. This resolves the melting issue and won’t ignite and continue to burn if accidentally exposed to the hazard.
3. Rolling up sleeves: Rolling up your sleeves may seem like the perfect way to beat the heat; however, this leaves the arms exposed and should be avoided. This is particularly important for arc flash exposures, as the arms will likely be closest to the event and therefore see the most thermal energy. Instead, look for F.R. clothing made with lightweight, moisture-wicking fabrics that provide a greater comfort level without sacrificing safety.
4. Unzipping coveralls or unbuttoning shirts: Just like rolling up your sleeves, unzipping or unbuttoning FR clothing can expose the skin or (as noted above) a non-FR under layer that could ignite and burn. Again, look for F.R. clothing made with lightweight, moisture-wicking fabrics that provide a greater comfort level without sacrificing safety.
5. Not tucking in the shirttail: If the tail of your shirt is not tucked correctly in, heat and flames can travel under the bottom of it and cause more significant injury. Invest in F.R. clothing that’s purposely constructed with long shirttails to prevent this from happening.

So, to make sure your F.R. clothing complies and ready to keep you safe, remember:

• Wear F.R. outerwear.
• Avoid synthetic under layers.
• Roll it down.
• Zip it up and tuck it in.

The study authors called for a federal government ban on the use of fire retardant chemicals in products intended for babies and children, a requirement that furniture manufacturers label their products and disclose which specific fire retardant chemicals are present, and reform of federal policies requiring toxicity testing before chemicals are sold in the U.S. I support these efforts and encourage consumers to make their concerns known.