Hand sanitizer has long been a staple in the purse of every mother with young children. When there isn’t a bathroom nearby, hand sanitizer could be a lifesaver after a child sneezes or spills something. In recent years, hand sanitizer has become a part of daily life and household sanitization practices.
Unfortunately, with more demand for hand sanitizer has come more safety issues. The FDA recently announced another recall related to cancer-causing chemicals in a company’s lineup of hand sanitizer products.
The FDA found dangerous chemicals in certain hand sanitizers
The point of using a hand sanitizer is to protect your health by killing pathogens, not to endanger it by exposing yourself to increased medical risk. Unfortunately, when you slather fluid on your hands full of a known carcinogen, you may do far more harm than good when trying to clean your skin.
After conducting the requested testing on some of the possibly affected hand sanitizers, the FDA found not just one but three kinds of potentially carcinogenic contamination. Like the hand sanitizers recalled earlier in the year, these samples included the known human carcinogen benzene. They also included acetaldehyde and acetal contaminants, both potential carcinogens. Hand sanitizers by ArtNaturals may be subject to this recall, and the FDA recommends that people do not use them.
Consumers should be able to trust that health and beauty products don’t contain dangerous cancer-causing chemicals like benzene. Tracking recalls can help you later connect a product you purchased with a major medical issue. Learning about product liability can help you hold companies accountable for dangerous business practices.