Are Tampons the Right Choice for You?

Are Tampons the Right Choice for You?

Tampons and other feminine care products are unavoidable for women and the choices in what products are used can influence their overall health. Most women are unaware and are oblivious to the hazards of using bleached feminine care products, but this article aims to educate women on how the choices they make today can have an affect on their overall health forever.

Drug store feminine care products are covenant, affordable and make menstruating look like fun. Most of these tampons however are bleached to make them aesthetically pleasing and have perfumes added to make them smell nice as well. This bleach that is used secretes a chemical called dioxin that is absorbed by the skin and is known to cause cancer, nervous system disorders, infertility, birth defects and a chronic condition called endometriosis (4, 2). Dioxin is the name of a family of chemicals that are a by-product of the production of other chemicals, such as the bleach found in tampons. These chemicals are colorless and odorless, therefore hard to detect, but none the less are there.

As mentioned earlier, endometriosis is a condition that can develop in a woman when dioxins are secreted by a tampon in the vagina. About 8-10% of all women that are of the age of reproduction have been diagnosed with this illness and will have to live with it for the rest of their lives (3). This condition causes severe pain, bleeding and inflammation in the pelvis, which could overall lead to infertility, or the inability to have children, which not only affects a woman’s physical health but also her mental health (1).

There is good news though, there are alternatives to using the standard bleached tampon. Organic, unbleached tampons and pads are safer for not only a woman’s health, but also for the environment. There are also washable and reusable menstrual pads, or a plastic menstrual cup. Even though these products may be more expensive or harder to obtain they are a safer approach to menstrual care.

The common bleached tampon may be covenant and look nice, but the dioxins that are been secreted and absorbed through the skin are doing women more harm than good. It is important to be aware of what chemicals are being exposed to our bodies, to ensure that we are not putting our health at risk.

Figure 1: האלופות (Photographer). (2015, December 5). Fleurcup and tampons.jpg.[digital image]. Retrieved from https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Fleurcup_and_tampons.jpg 

Literature Cited:

[1] Hogg, S., & Vyas, S. (2015). endometriosis. Obstetrics, Gynaecology & Reproductive Medicine, doi:10.1016/j.ogrm.2015.02.001

[2] Huang, Q., Chen, Y., Chen, Q., Zhang, H., Lin, Y., Zhu, M., & Dong, S. (2016). Dioxin-like rather than non-dioxin-like PCBs promote the development of endometriosis through stimulation of endocrine–inflammation interactions. Archives of Toxicology, , 1-10. doi:10.1007/s00204-016-1854-0

[3] Martinez-Zamora, M., Mattioli, L., Parera, J., Abad, E., Coloma, J., van Babel, B., . . . Institutionen för naturvetenskap och teknik. (2015). Increased levels of dioxin-like substances in adipose tissue in patients with deep infiltrating endometriosis. Human Reproduction, 30(5), 1059-1068. doi:10.1093/humrep/dev026

[4] The Editors of Encyclopedia Britannica. (2011, December 02). Dioxin. Retrieved March 06, 2017, from https://www.britannica.com/science/dioxin