Rule on Lead Safety

The New York Times reported yesterday that the EPA is now on track to implement a regulation requiring the construction industry to help prevent lead poisoning in children. Congress reportedly passed the legislation in 1992, but it took a lawsuit by environmental and public interest groups to pressure EPA to issue the rule. Click here to read the article.

FDA Crackdown on Food Labels

A couple of weeks ago, ABC News published the above-entitled story. FDA Commissioner Dr. Margaret Hamburg sent letters to 17 food manufacturers concerning their deceptive food labeling. Widely recognized manufacturers such as Dreyers Grand Ice Cream, Inc., Beech-nut, and Nestle were among recipients of Dr. Hambur's letters. Click here to read the story. Click here to see the list of companies and products.

Cell Phone Radiation

The Environmental Working Group (EWG) has published an article related to cell phone radiation, so you can read it by clicking here.

New Jersey Court Rules That Lawsuit Related To Baby Personal Care Products May Proceed

A federal judge in New Jersey recently upheld some consumer claims related to commonly recognized personal care products that are intended for use on infants -- namely, Johnson's Baby Shampoo and Target's Equate Tearless Baby Wash. One or both products allegedly contain methylene chloride, a substance banned by the FDA. Click here for information about methylene chloride. Click here to read the story published by Law.com.

Safe Cosmetics Ingredients -- iPhone App

Today I received daily highlights from Cosmeticsdesign.com and learned that a new iPhone application is available for users who care to monitor the ingredients comprising the personal care products they purchase. The developer claims that the app is touted as having a searchable database of 5000 ingredients. This is the link to Cosmetifique for iPhon and iPod Touch.

Organic Or Not? Silk report

So, as a proponent of transparency on consumer product packaging, I found an article published by the Cornucopia Institute this month interesting. The Institute reported that an investigation by the USDA's National Organic Program determined that Target corporation wrongly used an image of an organic product when promoting a conventional non-organic product to consumers. Click here to read Cornucopia's article. Minnesota Public Radio also published an article on this subject, here.

Doubt Is Their Product, Particularly those Targeted Toward Children

Consistent, or approximately so, with Michaels' "Doubt is Their Product," what does a company do when hurried to create doubt about safety of a baby/infant personal care product?  When faced with a public interest report about 1,4-dioxane in baby personal care products (click here) a company might ask people in China (click here) to say that ingredient isn't in whatever was manufactured there.

Canada Bans/Restricts Additional Personal Care Product Ingredients

Canada recently banned or restricted the use of 4 ingredients in cosmetics. Anyone interested can read the article by clicking here. Or, check the following against the labels on your own personal care products: 2-MEA (2-methoxyethanol acetate); DEGME - 2-(2-methoxyethoxy) ethanol; 2-methoxypropanol (reportedly not added, but may be an impurity); and Pigment Red 3.

Penguin House

I think this video is interesting about using light to make a small space seem larger. Click here.

Wyeth v Levine -- A great victory for a severely injured woman

On March 4, 2009, the United States Supreme Court issued its opinion in a case involving a woman who was severely injured by an antinausea drug called Phenergan, manufactured by Wyeth. After a clinician injected Ms. Levine with the drug by the IV push method, she developed gangrene and doctors amputated her forearm. The Vermont jury determined that Ms. Levine's injury would not have occurred if Phenergan's label included an adequate warning. Anyone who's interested in reading the opinion can click here, or simply be happy that the Supreme Court rejected Wyeth's argument that Ms. Levine could not recover from them for her injuries because federal law precluded her recovery under state law. The score was 6 to 3.