AN INITIAL HISTORICAL REVIEW OF ENVIRONMENTAL MINERALOGY AND GEOCHEMICAL OCCURRENCE OFMATERIALS OF CONCERN AND SURROUNDING ISSUES IN TALCUM POWDER AND BABY POWDER

Talcum powder and baby powder producers have sold a variety of products for decades. Historically, examples exist where these products have caused issues in the health and lives of consumers. Talc may contain minerals and anthropogenic materials that can cause harm. Several documents dating back decades were evaluated to better understand the historical nature of contamination of talc products. Example documents include those released by Reuters, peer-review literature, and historical newspapers. One issue evident in documents is that there are several examples of asbestos in talc products in the 1970s. Complexities in regulation efforts occurred during the 1970s and the FDA did not effectively regulate talc products at the time many asbestos findings were becoming evident. Scientific literature reports major methodological gaps developed by industry in the 1970s for asbestos detection in talc. Other manufacturing errors involving baby powder broadly have occurred in the industry in the past. One example is accidental introduction of toxic materials has occurred with 6% hexachlorophene deemed responsible for several tens of infant deaths in France in 1972. In 1952, 50 infant deaths occurred tied to arsenic poisoning where arsenic was accidentally used instead of zinc oxide. In the 1920s there are several historical accounts of where children (babies) had been “poisoned” by zinc stearate dusting powders. A newspaper report in 1926 indicates that there were 229 known cases of “smothering” involving zinc stearate dusting powders. There is some evidence of baby powder causing respiratory distress in infants through the 1980s. This review opens questions regarding the nature and extent of contamination of historical talc products. More detailed studies should be conducted on the mineralogy, geochemistry, and environmental geochemistry of historical and current talc products and geologic sources to understand the nature of contamination more fully.