Toxic-Free Laundry

A chunk of the toxins that bombard our bodies and the environment starts in our laundry room. Here we allow common petroleum-based detergents, fabric softeners and dryer sheets, most containing alarmingly high levels of toxic chemicals, according to public health watchdog Mike Adams, to permeate our clothes, before draining to pollute soil, air and waterways.

The clothing we put next to our skin counts because skin is our largest organ and the body’s most vital defense barrier supporting the immune system. Skin also serves as the body’s most efficient path to eliminate waste. "That’s why widely marketed products containing harmful petroleum ingredients (and that’s most of them) can plasticize and ‘constipate’ skin, making it more likely that germs will get in and stay in and less likely that toxins can get out," says Dale Schock, founder of Toxin-Free Basics.

Schock has spent the past decade collaborating with a corps of chemists researching, formulating and testing toxin-free products for family use. And she’s found that of 17,000 common chemicals, "few have been tested for toxicity, and fewer still have been tested in combination with each other." The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency reports that such chemicals have been linked to health problems such as allergies, birth defects, cancer and psychological abnormalities.

The good news is that any eco-conscious consumer now has easy access to more biologically compatible, more sustainable, toxin-free alternatives. Laundry products like Toxin-Free Basics, Seventh Generation and Maggie’s Soap Nuts not only are kind to humans, animals, fish and birds, they also encourage recovery of the planet. Soap nuts, which grow on Chinese Soapberry trees, have been used in India and Indonesia for centuries. Tests show that they leave clothes clean, unscented and soft.

For product information visit BetterLifeGoods.com, SeventhGeneration.com and TFBasics.com.