Julie Gosse, a University of Maine associate professor of molecular and biomedical sciences, has scanned the supermarket aisles for products that contain triclosan (TCS), a synthetic antibacterial agent.
Since the '90s, TCS has been in a slew of consumer products, including facial cleansers, toothpaste, mouthwash and hand sanitizers.
For years, Gosse has studied TCS, which for decades also has been used as a hospital scrub to reduce risk of infection.
She became interested in examining triclosan when listening to a talk by Environmental Protection Agency scientist Susan Richardson and noting that the molecular structure of TCS resembles the molecular structure of dioxins, which are toxic environmental pollutants.
In 2016, the Food and Drug Administration banned triclosan from consumer bar soaps, liquid soaps and body washes. At that time, the FDA challenged manufacturers to either prove TCS was more effective at killing germs than plain soap, or to remove it from their soap product within a year.
The antimicrobial agent, which is readily absorbed into the skin and the lining of the mouth, has recently been found to have detrimental effects on human fertility, development, thyroid function and immunology, and has been associated with increased occurrence of asthma.
Comment: Triclosan penetrates the skin and enters the blood stream quite easily. Earlier studies have shown that it hinders muscle function in both animals and humans, disrupts the endocrine system (particularly reproductive hormones), and has been found to be a potent cardiac depressant.