Baby wipes are necessary to every nursery. A lot of parents carry around baby wipes in their diaper bags and use them for diaper changes and emergency cleanups.
Hospital staff also uses this frequently to wipe down surfaces. They’re everywhere, yet, store-bought, disposable wipes are often loaded with chemicals – even the natural brands.
According to a recent research, baby wipes make some children come out in painful, red rashes. The University of Connecticut School of Medicine studied six children with severe rashes.
The first child was a girl who had a rash on her face and her buttocks. The eight-year-old had already been treated with antibiotics and steroids but after each treatment, the rash reappeared.
The scientists suspected that she might be suffering from an allergic reaction so asked her mother what she used to clean her.
The girl’s mother explained that she used wet wipes to clean her daughter’s mouth and buttocks. Unsurprisingly, when the girl’s mother then stopped using baby wipes, her rashes disappeared.
During the following two years, five more children were brought to the medical centre with similar rashes.
In each case, the rash disappeared as soon as the children were no longer cleaned with baby wipes.
One of the lead scientists, Dr. Mary Wu Chang remembers that during her previous studies, another case where a Belgian man had a severe chemical and allergic reaction to methylisothiazolinone, a chemical preservative called Methylisothiazolinone, which is the number one cause of allergic reaction not just in some children, but by a huge range of beauty products.
Another dermatologist, Dr. Ellen Frankel, also agrees with Dr. Chang that parents should not be using wipes on their children. She advised:
"I always tell parents do not under any circumstances use diaper wipes. They have a lot of chemicals in there, and can irritate skin that's already damaged sitting in urine, or feces, or sitting in a diaper that's just got an inclusive surface on it."
Methylisothiazolinone has been found in many of the popular brands such as Johnson & Johnson, Cottonelle, and Huggies to name a few. Now that this chemical is becoming a health and safety concern for children, they are reconsidering adding this ingredient to their products. Their goal now it to try and replace this harmful chemical with a more natural alternative.
To make sure this harmful chemical is not going to cause the same problems for your child, look at the ingredients on the side of the baby wipe box. If you see the chemical methylisothiazolinone, you may want to stop using those wipes and perhaps baby wipes altogether.
Although prepackaged wipes are the most convenient way to keep your children clean, the risk simply isn't worth it. Don't worry though, because there are other solutions such as creating your own DIY wipes at home with natural products, or simply using a cloth with warm water.
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