News this week that a popular baby item and common beauty product found in bathroom vanities and diaper bags everywhere is now the centre of a court ruling with some serious allegations attached. Check your supplies, read on, and do some research if wondering whether or not to continue using talc products.
Johnson & Johnson were ordered Monday by a Missouri jury to pay a $72 million dollar settlement to the family of a woman whose cancer they believe was linked to extended use of talc-based Shower to Shower and other baby powder products.
Jacqueline Fox of St. Louis Missouri died in late 2015 of ovarian cancer, only three years after receiving her diagnosis. The suit stated that Fox had been using the Johnson & Johnson product for 35 years before her death and that no risks were ever publicly associated with its use. The lawyer for Fox's family, Jere Beasley, has said that the company knew about the risks, telling NBC during a conference call that Johnson & Johnson "knew as far back as the 1980s of the risk," and that they were "lying to the public, lying to the regulatory agencies."
Business Insider reports that Beasley has said that "experts have found a link between While Beasley told Al.com that his experts found a link between ovarian cancer and talc powder," but nothing is conclusive.
From the American Cancer Society website:
Many studies in women have looked at the possible link between talcum powder and cancer of the ovary. Findings have been mixed, with some studies reporting a slightly increased risk and some reporting no increase. Many case-control studies have found a small increase in risk. But these types of studies can be biased because they often rely on a person's memory of talc use many years earlier. Two prospective cohort studies, which would not have the same type of potential bias, have not found an increased risk.
Johnson and Johnson have many other (like, 100s) of suits coming up after this one, with claims stating that the company did not "warn consumers that its talc-based products could cause cancer." NBC reports company spokeswoman as saying "We have no higher responsibility than the health and safety of consumers, and we are disappointed with the outcome of the trial. We sympathize with the plaintiff's family but firmly believe the safety of cosmetic talc is supported by decades of scientific evidence."
Baby powder is a product many families use in any number of ways, and it's a staple in some homes. Just the smell of a baby powder conjures up the heady days of my own children's first weeks at home. I don't recall any warning other than the inhalation risk, and used the product liberally. And our high school changeroom smelled like the inside of a giant tube of the stuff — we all used it — again, with no apparent or obvious side effects other than encroaching on other's olfactory rights. Personally I was never crazy about the fact that products existed to convince women they were inherently "unfresh" but that was the end of my hesitation. That's what's scary about rulings like this one: that so many years later a seemingly benign product has been deemed by a court to have caused damage.
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