Many women will agree that sanitary tampons and pads are one of humanity’s greatest invention. They save us of embarrassing moments, they make us feel more comfortable with ourselves during women’s sensitive period. Yet, sanitary tampons can contain harmful ingredients and the worrisome part is that manufacturing companies refuse to disclose this information.
Sanitary tampons and pads are similar in many senses with cotton wool. Next to this main ingredient, however, there are at times other ingredients that we may not be aware of. Some substances may be toxic and they increase health risks for women; therefore, there should be more transparency in the manufacturing process.
Sanitary tampon manufacturers are the only ones that refuse to disclose information about ingredients. Consumer organizations have been sustaining campaigns for decades to convince manufacturers to explain how sanitary tampons are made. Unfortunately, these products are labeled as medical devices by the Food and Drug Administration, so producers cannot be forced to disclose this data.
Democrat Carolyn Maloney from New York was the first to start initiatives to force tampon producers to label ingredients. She is asking them to showcase any perfume, fragrances, colorants, dyes and preservatives that are used for tampon pads.
Maloney’s requests are not at all exaggerate considering that all manufacturers inform their buyers this way. She has told the National Institute of Health that the disclosure of such information would not only help women defend themselves against illnesses, but it would also stimulate research in this domain.
So far, we know very little on the effects of tampons and pads on women’s health. We do not know for instance whether their use is indeed harmful to women as some medical suppositions have hinted.
Vaginal tissue is more sensitive than any other part of the human body. Some doctors believe the use of internal tampons for a long period of time can lead to ovarian cancer simply because the vaginal tissue is harmed by the long presence of these foreign parts over a long period of time. Yet, such hypotheses could not be verified because we lack knowledge on tampon ingredients.