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Most people know that bathroom habits differ the world over. While some are quite accustomed to our brightly-lit cozy bathrooms with comfortable sit-down toilet, for other cultures the toilet is a simple hole in the floor that requires users to squat to do their business.
While this may sound uncomfortable to pampered westerners, there is evidence to suggest that it may be superior to sitting comfortably on a toilet due to the way squatting tends to align the body for more efficient elimination.
Unfortunately, that’s not the only unhealthy habit we westerners have where matters of elimination are concerned. Another concern is what we use to tidy up when we are finished.
As you might expect, there are numerous products available for us to take advantage of and they include a dizzying variety of bathroom tissue, or toilet paper that’s manufactured to look as clean and white as freshly-fallen snow, and therein lies part of the problem!
While paper is not a word we normally associate with health hazards, like so many other products we used in our industrialized society, there is more than meets the eye where paper – and in this case, toilet paper – is concerned.
As you may already suspect, the main problem is the chemicals that are used to manufacture toilet paper give it its pristine white color and soft texture.
Bisphenol-A (BPA)
Recycled bathroom tissue may sound like a good way to help protect the environment but that concern probably does not trump the health and well-being of yourself and your family. Since recycled bathroom tissue is made from various other paper products such as cash register receipts, the chemicals that are used to manufacture those kinds of paper often end up in recycled toilet paper. The most notorious of those chemicals might be Bisphenol-A, better know to many as BPA. BPA is a well known endocrine disruptor, which means is can wreak havoc on your hormone levels. The good news is that recycled toilet paper normally contains just a tiny bit of BPA which does not represent a particularly serious health hazard. Considering all the other things we handle that contain BPA, most of us really don’t need to be increasing our exposure even a little bit.
Bisphenol-S (BPS)
Although not quite as well-known as BPA, BPS or Bisphenol-S is another sneaky ingredient used by manufacturers. Since consumers have become increasingly aware of the dangers associated with the use of BPA, some manufacturers have swapped it out in favor of BPS. Not as much is known about as BPS at this point but early research is not encouraging. So far it appears that BPS may be slightly less disruptive to the body’s hormones, but it may be more readily absorbed by the skin than BPA is, so it may not be a very desirable replacement.
Formaldehyde
Yep, this is that strong-smelling stuff they used to preserve dead frogs and other critters for use in high school science class. Manufacturers come up with all kinds of creative ways to make toilet tissue a bit stronger and using formaldehyde in the manufacturing process supposedly helps. The problems with it is that it is a known skin irritant and has also been linked to cancer.
Chlorine
We’ve probably all heard of chlorine bleach and know of its superior ability to remove color and stains from clothing and other things. It’s also used by manufacturers to give toilet paper that snow-white color that seems to be so important. Like anything else you put on your skin, ingredients such as chlorine bleach can enter the body and can build up over long periods of time and cause numerous health problems.
Mineral Oil
This ingredient can be a problem with brands that advertise their products as containing “lotion,” presumably to make their use more comfortable and soothing. What they don’t advertise is that the “lotion” may contain petroleum-based mineral oils. Although no specific health hazards are known to be associated with these ingredients specifically, it may be best to exercise caution and skip the “lotion” option and keep things as basic as possible. There are some people that report a burning sensation on the skin when they use these “lotion”-infused toilet paper products.
What is the solution to this, apart from simply washing your behind with water and then washing your hands with soap and water?
Surely not everyone is going to worry about the chemicals that are used to make the toilet paper they use, but for folks who are concerned, there area alternatives to the traditional snow-white and chemically-treated product we are so accustomed to. Believe it or not, you can by toilet tissue that has not been treated with numerous chemicals and is actually colored brown! This may be a more appropriate color, considering what we use it for, but be aware that it is not likely to be as soft as the chemically-treated variety but it should reduce your exposure to man-made chemicals that may represent a health hazard.
Source: Thinkingabouthealth.com
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