Tag Archives: Environmental Working Group

Formaldehyde Risks in Depth – Concerns Rise Over Workplace Exposure

January 9, 2012 By in Jack Benton, News, OSHA News, PEL Exposure Limits, Personal Safety, Workplace Safety Tags: , , , , , , , 2 Comments

Source: AP

Beauty salons and mortuaries in recent years have received numerous OSHA citations for violating federal exposure standards for formaldehyde. Several hair-straightening products contain the carcinogenic chemical.

Although beauty salons and mortuaries have drawn the most citations and fines for violating the federal exposure standard for formaldehyde among smaller companies, employer awareness of the hazards of this carcinogenic chemical and the details of complying with the standard vary widely in these two predominantly middle-market industries.

Because funeral directors and embalmers have a long history of working with formaldehyde, which chemical experts say is indispensable for preparing the human body for viewing, the National Funeral Directors Assn. has developed a best practice protocol for working with formaldehyde.

By contrast, beauty salon owners and stylists generally lack a scientific background and don’t have a keen awareness of the danger of working with products that contain formaldehyde, experts say. This is complicated by the fact that manufacturers of several popular hair-straightening products containing formaldehyde have mislabeled the products and not disclosed their formaldehyde content, according to the Occupational Safety and Health Administration.

Another problem is that, for the lay person, there are many unrecognizable names for formaldehyde, including methylene glycol, formalin and oxomethane, according to OSHA.

From October 2010 through September 2011 among companies with up to 99 employees, beauty salons racked up 62 citations for violating OSHA’s formaldehyde standard; funeral homes and crematories drew 16 citations.

An OSHA hazard alert said the agency is investigating “complaints from stylists and hair salon owners about exposure to formaldehyde while using hair-smoothing products such as Brazilian Blowout, Brasil Cacau Cadiveau, Keratin Complex Smoothing Therapy and Marcia Teixeira….Some of these products were labeled formaldehyde-free.”

“OSHA has conducted air sampling at multiple salons and found formaldehyde in the air when stylists were using hair smoothing products,” according to the hazard alert.

In a December 2010 advisory, Health Canada said it found up to 7% formaldehyde content in some hair-straightening products.

In September 2011, OSHA said it cited two manufacturers and distributors of hair-straightening products, including Keratin Complex Smoothing Therapy and Marcia Teixeira, “for failing to ensure that material safety data sheets reflected the content of formaldehyde in the product or the hazards associated with formaldehyde exposure, as well as for failing to develop a written hazard communication program for their own employees.”

The Professional Beauty Assn., a trade group representing beauty salons, “strives to inform and educate the professional beauty industry on a variety of topics and issues,” Myra Irizarry, government affairs director in Scottsdale, Ariz., said in an email.

The PBA posted “What You Don’t Know Can Hurt You: A Message from OSHA” on its website, stating that OSHA “has found that some hair-smoothing products may contain formaldehyde, may release formaldehyde at levels above OSHA’s permissible exposure limits during use and may be mislabeled, all of which can pose health risks to salon workers.”

The PBA website also contains detailed information about OSHA and other health agency findings of formaldehyde in keratin-based hair products. It urged salon workers to follow OSHA’s formaldehyde standard, to stay informed and take appropriate precautions as the “controversy” continues to be studied.

Salon owners across the country surveyed by the Washington-based nonprofit Environmental Working Group last spring were either unaware of the formaldehyde content in Keratin Complex Smoothing Therapy and similar products, minimized the danger of exposure or considered the issue “controversial.”

The distributor of Brazilian Blowout posted a disclaimer on its website stating that “while the media continues to report that Brazilian Blowout contains 8% to 10% formaldehyde, it is important to understand that this relates to the measure of potential formaldehyde released at a level that never occurs in a real-world application.

“As federal OSHA is aware, the only accurate method of testing free formaldehyde exposure is via controlled air monitoring. Every controlled air monitoring test conducted by OSHA and alternate reputable institutions has produced results conveying that the Brazilian Blowout Smoothing Treatment falls well beneath even the most stringent of OSHA safety standards,” according to the distributor, Brazilian Blowout, North Hollywood, Calif.

“This information is now being communicated to the FDA, demonstrating that the Brazilian Blowout complies with all air monitoring guidelines.

“You can continue to confidently offer the Brazilian Blowout to your customers with the knowledge that the Brazilian Blowout falls well below the safety standards set by OSHA,” the distributor said.

Jeremy Lurie, marketing specialist at M&M International in Delray Beach, Fla., which distributes Marcia Teixeira keratin treatments, said the treatments do not contain formaldehyde. “I’ve never been one to shy away from truth in advertising,” he said, noting that the company’s website says that their original treatments contain methylene glycol, which produces a trace amount of formaldehyde gas when heated, and are “substantially below OSHA standards for safe exposure.”

“What caused the controversy is misrepresentation by other companies that their products are formaldehyde-free,” Mr. Lurie said. “Our newest products, Soft and Soft Chocolate, do not contain any ingredients that produce formaldehyde.”

On the Keratin Complex website, Larry Solomon, president, wrote: “We disagree with OSHA’s inflammatory and inaccurate report and we are asking for a full retraction. Keratin Complex not only complies with all OSHA standards, but we meet or exceed their safety standards and requirements.”

“Some salons have taken appropriate precautions by discontinuing the use of these products. However, as of the spring when we published our report, over 60% of top salons nationwide were still using keratin-straightening products,” said a spokeswoman for the Washington-based Environmental Working Group, which has urged the FDA to take these products off the market.

A small salon owner, who wished to remain unidentified, said that one distributor cited by OSHA “swore up and down there was no formaldehyde” in its keratin products. He continued: “We stopped using most of (them). We found that most of those companies haven’t been honest with us. A couple of clients want them and we have them sign a release, saying we’re not sure what’s in the product.”

Hair Cuttery, a national chain, advertises on its website that it provides a “Keratin Smoothing System.” In response to a question about what precautions are taken to protect stylists against formaldehyde exposure when using keratin products, a spokeswoman for Hair Cuttery parent Ratner Cos. in Vienna, Va., said in an email that “We do not use straightening products that contain formaldehyde in our salons.”

When questioned about this discrepancy and whether the company had discontinued using Keratin Smoothing System, she said, “The system we use is Bionaza Premiere Brazilian Keratin Treatment and it is formaldehyde-free.”

Salons across the country continue to advertise keratin hair- smoothing services on their websites, including Joseph Michael’s Salon & Spa in Chicago.

“The main precaution we take is a large carbon filter system that’s portable and goes with the stylist,” said Allison Vannoy, general manager. “We let the stylist decide whether to do the services or not. All are welcome to wear a mask, but most don’t. We haven’t seen any adverse results and if we do, we’ll take a second look,” she said. “We look at the (OSHA) regulations on a pretty regular basis,” she said.

“If you follow best practices management, you can use (formaldehyde) safely,” said John Reed Sr., owner of Dodd & Reed Funeral Home in Webster Springs, West Va., and past president of the NFDA. “A good exhaust system” is a main precaution as well as “absolutely monitoring the air” and wearing gloves and masks when working with products containing formaldehyde, he said.

“The best precaution is to follow OSHA guidelines, and really the best way is proper ventilation. Keep that air changing in the room,” said Vernie Fountain, a licensed funeral director and owner of Fountain National Academy in Springfield, Mo., which teaches “difficult embalming cases and post-mortem reconstructive surgery.”

“I know from limited experience with salons that they don’t have a safety and health or hazard communication program that they review with employees,” said Jack Luckhardt, president of safety and health consultant The Luckhardt Group in Oviedo, Fla. “They need to check the labels of all the materials they have and make sure they have a material safety data sheet. They need to get the information and make it available to employees and watch out for warning signs,” such as itching or burning in the eyes, said Mr. Luckhardt, a former board member of the American Society of Safety Engineers.

“But one of the problems they’re up against is there are manufacturers of hair care products that were labeled as formaldehyde-free, when in fact the products when heated release formaldehyde,” he said.

“I think a lot of the salons are flying blind,” Mr. Luckhardt said.

High Levels of Hexavalent Chromium Found in Chicago-Area Tap Water

December 19, 2010 By in Consumer Alert, Consumer Safety, Environmental, Hexavalent Chromium, News, Public Safety Tags: , , , , , , , , 2 Comments

The cancer-causing metal made infamous by the movie “Erin Brockovich” is turning up in tap water from Chicago and more than two dozen other cities, according to a new study that urges federal regulators to adopt tougher standards.

Even though scientists at the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and National Toxicology Program have linked the ingestion of hexavalent chromium to cancer, the EPA doesn’t require Chicago or other cities to test for the toxic metal. Nor does the EPA limit the dangerous form of chromium in drinking water.

To take a snapshot of what is flowing through taps across the nation, the Environmental Working Group, a Washington-based research and advocacy organization, hired an independent laboratory that found the metal in treated drinking water from 31 cities. The amount in Lake Michigan water pumped to 7 million people in Chicago and its suburbs was 0.18 parts per billion, three times higher than a safety limit California officials proposed last year.

A handful of other cities were significantly above the proposed California limit, including Norman, Okla.; Honolulu; Riverside, Calif.; and Madison, Wis., according to a report to be released Monday. Levels in Milwaukee water were the same as in Chicago.
In other major cities, hexavalent chromium levels ranged from 0.20 parts per billion in Los Angeles and Atlanta to 0.18 in New York and 0.03 in Boston.

The new findings could pose another challenge for utilities that are detecting dozens of unregulated substances in treated drinking water, including pharmaceutical drugs and industrial chemicals that can pass unfiltered through conventional treatment methods. Chromium can be found naturally in the environment but also is released by industry into waterways.

While the potential health threats of many pollutants are still being studied, researchers say there is a clear risk of stomach cancer from drinking water contaminated with hexavalent chromium, also known as chromium-6.

“For years, scientists assumed this wasn’t a problem because acids in our stomachs can convert chromium-6 into chromium-3, an essential nutrient,” said Rebecca Sutton, a senior scientist with the Environmental Working Group. “Newer science is showing our stomachs can’t take care of everything, which means the dangerous form of chromium is getting into our bodies and can cause damage.”

Studies outlining the dangers of chromium-contaminated water add to long-standing concerns about inhaling metallic vapors, in particular by workers at chrome plating factories. Yet Chicago, like most other cities, does not routinely test for the dangerous form of the metal.

Officials at the Chicago Department of Water Management did not respond to repeated inquiries last week from the Tribune, but other water officials said tap water is still safe. Bottled water, which often comes from municipal tap water supplies, wasn’t tested.

Lon Couillard, water quality manager in Milwaukee, said more study is needed to determine the sources of chromium. He suggested that in some cases it could be coming from chrome-plated plumbing fixtures, not passing through municipal treatment plants.

“They’re trying to scare people,” Couillard said of the environmental group that found hexavalent chromium in his city’s tap water.

The source of chromium in Chicago drinking water is unclear, though federal records show that some of the nation’s biggest industrial sources are four steel mills in northwest Indiana that discharge wastewater into the city’s source of drinking water.

Last year alone, records show, the U.S. Steel and Arcelor Mittal mills dumped a combined 3,100 pounds of chromium into Lake Michigan and its tributaries, less than 9 miles away from Chicago’s water-intake crib off 68th Street. (The federal Toxics Release Inventory doesn’t require industry to report specific types of the metal, but chromium-6 and chromium-3 convert into the other form and back in the environment.)

Indiana officials once sought to relax limits on chromium discharges from U.S. Steel’s massive Gary Works, the largest industrial polluter on the Great Lakes. State officials backed down and imposed more stringent restrictions after Tribune reporting prompted federal regulators in 2007 to block a new water permit for the steel mill.

Industry has fought for years to block tougher federal and state limits on chromium, which has contaminated drinking water supplies across the country. The award-winning movie “Erin Brockovich” dramatizes one of the most high-profile cases: a miles-long plume of hexavalent chromium dumped by a utility in rural Hinkley, Calif., that led to a $333 million legal settlement over illnesses and cancers.

California often sets environmental policies that later are adopted nationwide. As the scope of the chromium problem has become more apparent, drinking-water utilities that could be forced to improve treatment methods have joined companies that discharge the metal into waterways in opposing regulations.

Attorneys for both interest groups delayed California’s proposed safety limit by requesting an independent review of the science behind it. They also are questioning peer-reviewed findings by California and federal scientists by commissioning their own research.

” Honeywell is committed to protecting health and the environment,” a lawyer for the aerospace conglomerate wrote in a November 2009 letter to California officials. “We also believe that decisions about chemical risks and cleanup goals must be based on sound science.”

Since then, four of the five reviewers who took another look at California’s proposal supported the state’s conclusions. One reviewer, Mitchell Cohen of the New York University School of Medicine, said the chromium limit “should be accepted as one based upon sound scientific knowledge, methods and practices.”

Environmental officials in New Jersey also have weighed in backing the proposed California limit. And in September, the U.S. EPA published a draft review that found hexavalent chromium in drinking water is “likely to be carcinogenic in humans.” The EPA’s report could be the first step toward a national standard.

Outside of California, several drinking water officials said they were not aware of the ongoing debate.

“This is new territory for us,” said Tom Heikkinen, general manager of the water utility in Madison, where the amount of hexavalent chromium was 1.58 parts per billion, more than 26 times higher than the proposed California safety limit. “We’re going to be following this closely to see what the scientists and regulators say.”

Corurtesy of WGN and  mhawthorne@tribune.com