\n<\/p>\n
Should you be worried about lead and other toxic metals in your tampons? That\u2019s the question on everyone\u2019s mind this week following the release of a new study that has users of the hygiene product on edge.<\/p>\n
The study, published in the August edition of the journal Environment International<\/em>, found that \u201cseveral toxic metals, including lead\u201d were detected in tampons that the researchers purchased from brick-and-mortar stores in New York City, Athens, Greece, and London, plus from two \u201cmajor online retailers.\u201d Researchers studied the concentrations of 16 metalloids in 30 tampons across 18 product lines from 14 unnamed brands (both brand-name and \u201cstore-brand\u201d). Their report states that they found \u201celevated mean concentrations\u201d of lead, cadmium, and arsenic in all the tampons tested. They also found that \u201clead concentrations were higher in non-organic tampons,\u201d while organic tampons had higher levels of arsenic. The highest concentration of any metalloid found in the tampons overall was zinc.<\/p>\n So what does this mean for tampon users? Should people immediately throw theirs away and switch to another type of menstruation product for good? It\u2019s understandable that seeing the words \u201clead\u201d and \u201carsenic\u201d associated with something you put inside your body on a regular basis would set off alarm bells. Both of those metals can contribute to some very serious health issues\u2014especially if you\u2019re thinking about having or adding to a family\u2014but it\u2019s not necessarily worth freaking out just yet. <\/p>\n \u201cUsers should stay informed but not panic,\u201d says Dr. Lucky Sekhon, M.D., a board-certified reproductive endocrinologist and OB-GYN at RMA New York. \u201cThe study found trace amounts of toxic metals in tampons, but the levels were generally low,\u201d she explains, adding that there is \u201cno indication\u201d that these metals at the detected levels can leach into the body. \u201cGiven the limited amount of exposure to tampons\u2014generally used for four to seven days per month\u2014and the small amounts of heavy metals detected, it is likely safe to continue using tampons.\u201d<\/p>\n While the summary findings seem alarming at first, it\u2019s worth noting that there are a lot of \u201cmaybes\u201d regarding this study. For one, researchers didn\u2019t share which tampon varieties they studied, so, despite what you may have heard on social media in the past few days, users can\u2019t know for sure whether their specific brand was impacted. And without knowing which companies are making said tampons, \u201cit is difficult to identify\u2026 if there is a specific country or source of where the contaminants are from,\u201d explains Dr. Meleen Chuang, MD, chief of obstetrics and gynecology at NYU Langone Hospital Brooklyn. Dr. Chuang points out that some of the metalloids the study calls out are being added intentionally during production. \u201cThe study notes that metals such as calcium and zinc are intentionally added to help with odor control,\u201d she says. The FDA notes that lead present in food often occurs because the lead that was once commonly used in paint, gasoline, and other products has leached into the soil, which in turn shows up in crops. It\u2019s possible (though, again, we can\u2019t know for sure) that the same is happening to the cotton that\u2019s used to make many tampons.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Should you be worried about lead and other toxic metals in your tampons? That\u2019s the question on everyone\u2019s mind this<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":18350,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_coblocks_attr":"","_coblocks_dimensions":"","_coblocks_responsive_height":"","_coblocks_accordion_ie_support":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[17],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-18349","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-beauty"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/veefind.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18349","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/veefind.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/veefind.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/veefind.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/veefind.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=18349"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/veefind.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18349\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/veefind.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/18350"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/veefind.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=18349"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/veefind.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=18349"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/veefind.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=18349"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}