I admit it… I was addicted to bubbles. I’ve long had the connection that bubbles mean clean. Like Pavlov’s dog knows that a bell means food, I know that bubbles mean clean…looks like the dog and I were both wrong. Just like it was not the bell that brought the food, it is not the bubbles that provide the clean. In the end, it actually looks like the bubbles are working against us.
We have been trained to think that soaps need to bubble. Bubble baths, suds of dishes, a foaming shampoo…no questions asked, soaps should bubble. But why? Sure, the bubbles are pretty, they fill the sink, they feel good in our hair and the kids sure like to play in them, but where do they come from and do we really need them? Looking into the ingredients of my old favourite bubbling cleaners I find that we are better off being bubble free.
The most common ingredient found in hand soap, dish soap, shampoo, shaving creams and even toothpaste that offer us that irresistible lather is Sodium Lauryl Sulfate (SLS). However, in higher concentrations, SLS is also used in industrial products, including engine degreasers, floor cleaners, and car wash soaps. Admittedly, the concentrations in our household products are considerably lower, but it still begs the question, do I want to wash my hair and my car with the same ingredients? (My car is not that fancy.)
So let’s look at the benefits of SLS. It is an inexpensive ingredient for manufacturers, and it is a highly effective surfactant for any task requiring the removal of oily stains and residue. Sounds great for my dishes. And then of course, there are those beautiful bubbles. There are many myths about SLS, most significantly that of SLS being a cancer-causing carcinogen. Treehugger.com (a wealth of information about all things “green”) decided to do their own research to test this eco-myth. They found that part of the confusion likely arises from the fact that sodium lauryl sulfate is in fact frequently implicated in cancer experiments. However, it is always used to solubilise chemicals prior to being injected into test animals and never the active ingredient. No evidence in the literature has ever been found directly linking SLS to cancer.
So you may be asking yourself at this point, why should I to give up my bubbles? According to Healthy-Communications.com, sodium lauryl sulfate is used throughout the world for clinical testing as a primary skin irritant. Laboratories use it to irritate skin on test animals and humans so that they may then test healing agents to see how effective they are on the irritated skin. A study at the Medical College of Georgia indicated that SLS penetrated into the eyes as well as brain, heart, liver, etc., and showed long-term retention in the tissues. The study also indicated that SLS penetrated young children’s eyes and prevented them from developing properly and caused cataracts to develop in adults (http://www.healthy-communications.com/slsmostdangerousirritant.html). It also noted that SLS may cause hair loss by attacking the follicle and is classified as a drug in bubble baths because it eats away skin protection and causes rashes and infection to occur.
So, although SLS doesn’t cause cancer (thank goodness), there are certainly some not so beautiful things about our beautiful bubbles. Those SLS-induced bubbles are potentially harmful to some organs (including the skin) and hairs. SLS cleans by corrosion and dries skin by stripping the protective lipids from the surface so it can’t effectively regulate moisture.
I’ve forced my family to go cold turkey. Within about 1 week, we forgot about our need for the big bubbles. We have eliminated SLS from our household cleaning products and we have found a great brand of shampoo, conditioner, face soap and even toothpaste to help begin the bad-bubble detox. And with the help of a gentle cleanser and foaming agent from coconut and corn (Coco Glucoside) we get just enough natural suds to feed that bubble addiction
Tags: bubbles, eco-friendly, green clean, healthly, non toxic clean, shampoo, SLS, soap
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