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 Researchers surveyed parents about how often they used 26 common
household cleaners over babies' first three to four months of life.
By the time the kids were 3 years old, children with the highest
exposure to cleaning products were 37% more likely to have been
diagnosed with asthma than those with the least exposure.
With greater exposure to cleaning products, kids were also 35% more
likely to have chronic wheezing and 49% more likely to have chronic
allergies, the study found.
"Parents are striving to maintain a healthy home for their
children," said study coauthor Dr. Tim Takaro of Simon Fraser
University in Vancouver, Canada.
"We want parents to question the socially accepted norm that a home
needs to smell like chemical-based cleaning products in order to be
clean," Takaro by email. "Instead, we propose that the smell of a
healthy home is no smell at all."
In other words, parents should read labels and look for items that
are free of dye and perfume, and consider natural cleaning products
instead of chemical alternatives.
The first months of life are critical for development of the immune
and respiratory systems, and exposure to chemicals inside the home
is particularly problematic because infants spend so much time
indoors, the study team writes in the journal CMAJ.
Chemicals in cleaning products can cause chronic inflammation that
may contribute to development of asthma or make symptoms more
frequent or severe, the researchers note.
Most kids in the study were white, and most parents were non-smokers
without any history of asthma.
Because asthma can be difficult to diagnose with breathing tests in
very young children, researchers also tested kids' skin for
allergies and asked parents how often children experienced symptoms
like wheezing.
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The most commonly used cleaning products in the study were
dishwashing soap, dishwasher detergent, multipurpose spray cleaners,
glass cleaners and laundry soap.
The study wasn't designed to prove whether or how any specific
cleaning products or chemicals in these products might directly
cause asthma symptoms.
The American Lung Association recommends against using cleaning
products that contain volatile organic compounds, fragrance and
other irritants, but manufacturers in Canada and the United States
are not required to list all ingredients in cleaning products. Some
"green" products may contain harmful substances, as these products
are not regulated, the study team notes.
"While much remains unknown, we think that these cleaning products
(and the chemicals they contain) act as irritants to the airways of
growing children," Dr. Elissa Abrams of the University of Manitoba,
in Winnipeg, Canada, who wrote a commentary accompanying the study.
Young children who spend a lot of time indoors, and especially
babies and toddlers who touch everything with their hands and
mouths, may be especially vulnerable, Abrams said by email.
"The take-home message is that parents should be careful which
cleaning products they use in the home," Abrams said.
SOURCE: https://bit.ly/38QjTBG and https://bit.ly/2SCOvRw CMAJ,
online February 18, 2020.
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