The Scoop on Triclosan

Due to the amount of curiosity spurred about the antimicrobial agent that was mentioned in discussion on Tuesday, I decided to do some research on triclosan and share its relevance to us. Having a relatively surface understanding of triclosan myself, I contacted a colleague, Beth Fawcett, who has done extensive research on the drug and who I knew would lead me in the right direction. Beth directed me towards a very useful article entitled The Ubiquitous Triclosan, A common antimicrobial agent exposed, written by Aviva Glaser, that explains triclosan in great detail. From that article and a few others, I gathered a bit more information about the drug that tends to be related to many long term health defects.

2,4,4’-Trichloro-2’-hydroxydiphenyl ether

So what is triclosan? Quite simply it's a disinfectant used in various consumer products including Dial liquid soap, Colgate Total toothpaste, Garden Botanika cosmetics, Playskool toys for children, Dickies socks, and Gillette shaving products. Due to its potent ability to inhibit bacterial reproduction by targeting a specific bacteria-protein carrying enzyme, triclosan and other antimicrobial agents have been shown to prevent hospital-acquired infections when used under appropriate conditions1. However, when it comes to household efficiency, these agents prove to be less than necessary; when tested in over 200 homes, antimicrobial agents showed no effect on reducing the risk of experiencing symptoms of harmful diseases2. There have been cases reported in which skin irritations appeared after triclosan exposure, leading to dermatology studies. In such research, triclosan is tested for the ability to cause skin irritations like photoallergic contact dermatitis, which causes eczematous rashes on the neck, face, and back of hands upon contact with sunlight. Long term exposure of triclosan was tested on mice, common animals chosen for biological research in place of human subjects, which showed that triclosan eventually lowers body temperature and leads to a depressant effect on the central nervous system3. The everlasting debate about the risks of triclosan has led to even further research at the University of Colorado and the University of California that has linked triclosan to the deterioration of muscle function, including the heart, when tested on mice.

So considering the small amount of good triclosan can do and the large amount of bad suspected of it, I would steer clear. Isn't it better to be safe than sorry anyway?


1Levy, S. B. 2002. Antimicrobial Consumer Products. Archives of Dermatology 138:1087-1088.
2Larson, E. L., S. X. Lin, C. Gomez-Pichardo, and P. Della-La�a. 2004. Effect of anti-bacterial home cleaning and handwashing products on infectious disease symptoms: a randomized, double-blind trial. Annals of Internal Medicine 140:321-329

3Miller, T.L., Lorusso D. J., Walsh M. L., and M. L. Deinzer. 1983. The acute toxicity of penta-, hexa-, and heptachlorohydroxydiphenyl ethers in mice. Journal of Toxicology and Environmental Health 12 (2-3):245-53. 

Migration is Crucial

Its great knowing every day we can buy products that are being manufactured in other countries. But do we realize how these products are produced, shipped, packed? Some people including myself don’t think about how these products were done or what it took to make them, we just buy them. Yes we read the tags and they may say “Made in China” or “Made in Japan,” but do we honestly think about it? This brings up the question as to “Why migration and migrant workers are important.”

Migration has evolved greatly throughout the centuries. International migration has a big part in our society and where we live. This is because migrants travel in big groups. It all comes down to how many people travel away and how many people they lose. Migrants tend to leave places because of wars, rise and fall of empires, economic expansion, political changes, and a few other reasons.

Comparing the past to the present migration has had a drastic increase. Migrants are starting to travel all over the world especially to Asia and China because those countries are on the rise. When migrants travel it hurts the other countries because they are losing out on workers who help produce and sell their products.

One major issue that happened in the past was women were not allowed to migrate like the males. The women's duties were to take care of the children and be house wives. This affected the women because the income their husbands brought in was barely enough for them to live off of. Finally when women were allowed to work they were given the worse possible jobs ever. Being a female was a down fall because men were always given the upper hand with the best jobs. Women Migrant Workers usually had poor living conditions and were forced into sexual slavery. That article was something I found really interesting.

Overall migration is going to be a very important aspect in the world and I believe the rich will get richer and the poor will get richer.