Poor Chemical Regulations May Be Responsible for Denture Cream Zinc Poisoning

New York, NYA commenter from the New York Times claims that a lack of sufficient regulations for chemicals appearing in consumer products may have led to the current rush of lawsuits related to denture cream zinc poisoning.

In his economic scene column, David Leonhardt suggests that the rise in development disorders over the past several years may have resulted from the use – conscious or otherwise – of chemicals common in household products like pain ointments, birth control medications and denture cream.

The columnist notes that science has not come far enough in its exploration of these chemicals to determine if the readily available products are responsible for these health concerns, which prevents manufacturers from issuing warnings to the general public, as they must conclusively prove that an item is harmful before casting aspersions.

Alan Goldberg, a toxicologist at Johns Hopkins, told the Times that he can only gather information on about 20 percent of the chemicals that people interact with on a daily basis due to corporate secrecy and lack of funding.

Erik Olsen, a food and consumer product expert at the Pew Charitable Trusts, argued that the current lack of information left the country "a heck of a lot closer to the Wild West than the nanny state."