SSRI Stories

I would like to direct you to a website I feel is WELL worth your time to look into.

http://www.ssristories.com/

Please take the time, just even a few minutes to only look at the home page. This is IMPORTANT. We like to fancy ourselves as educated and intelligent people full of choices. If this is to be true, we must seek out information in complete forms from every possible aspect in order to make an informed decision, in order to make a real "choice".

This is a "tool" that CAN have benefit in improving lives but is often overused, under regulated, and CAN induce traumatic events.

So I had an interaction with someone proporting Borax and nontoxic and ideal for personal cleanser production. I responded with suspect toward borax being nontoxic and offered Shaklee's GET CLEAN line as a safe, more convenient, time saving, less expensive alternative. Her reply was a bunch of questions about the product ingredients and

Here's the response from Shaklee:

Thanks for passing along the comments made by...[withheld] ...regarding Shaklee products and hope the following information is helpful to her.

Borax (or borate)
Borax, or sodium tetra borate, has been used for many years in laundry products as a booster. It functions in a manner similar to phosphates by increasing the alkalinity of the washwater, as well as the effectiveness of anionic and non-ionic surfactants. While borax is a natural ingredient,it can have a perceptible effect on the environment through use in laundry products, such as contributing to nutrient imbalance in soils as well as algae bloom in waterways.

A study conducted by the Washington Toxics Coalition (WTC), published in October 1990, observed that the presence of arsenic in detergents appeared to be related the amount of phosphates present. Their study included a number of borax-containing products in which the presence of arsenic was also noted. In non-phosphate and non-borate products no arsenic was found.

Get Clean - ingredients
While the ingredient base for most of the Get Clean products are from sustainable sources such as corn and coconut, we do not list the specific ingredients for all of the cleaners as some of the formulae are proprietary. In the case of Basic H2 Organic Super Concentrate Cleaner: the product is 99.95% natural and made from Water, Alkyl Polyglucoside (from Corn & Coconut), Ethyoxylated Fatty Alcohol (from Coconut), Xanthan Gum (from vegetables) and Methyl Chloro Isothiazolinone (biodegradable preservative)

The ingredient information we currently provide for our products actually exceeds the legal requirements for manufacturers of household cleaners - who are required to list ingredients on labels only if they are hazardous, have legal limits, or are required by the EPA. Indeed, if you peruse the labels of many competitor products who claim they do list ingredients, you will note that they often list anionic surfactant, non-ionic surfactant, stabilizer, etc., which is simply a detergent builder list and not the actual ingredients in the product.

Ingredient information we do make available can be found in the attached Ingredient Glossary document.

Get Clean - non-toxic

All ingredients used in Shaklee Get Clean products and FDA-approved, not harmful, and readily biodegradable. However, we do not use a non-toxic claim for all of the Get Clean products. This is because n order to make a non-toxic claim, manufacturers are required to conduct in-vivo (animal) testing to validate the non-toxic claim. As there are ingredients that have enough data that do not require in-vivo test results, a number of our Get Clean products that include these compounds do have a non-toxic claim on their respective labels. Those Get Clean products that do not include non-toxic on the labels is due to the fact that we would have do animal testing to validate -and as we are not doing animal testing, we cannot make this claim. Shaklee Corporation is opposed to animal testing and does not conduct any animal testing of any kind on any Shaklee product marketed anywhere in the world.

Basic H2 Wipes includes the "Not to use as a skin wipe" statement because the product is designed for cleaning surfaces in and around the home. It the wipes were designed for the skin, BAsic H2 would be a personal care product.


Ammonium laureth sulfate
Ammonium laureth sulfate is derived from a fatty acid found in coconut oil, and is a surfactant approved by the FDA monograph for personal care product ingredients that are proven effective and safe based on long-term use by millions of people and tens of millions of applications. Additionally, the Cosmetic Ingredient Review (CIR) panel, an expert and independent group of eminent scientists and medical practitioners who assess the safety of personal care product ngredients, and whose findings are published in the Journal of the American College of Toxicology, has approved ammonium laureth sulfate as safe for use in personal care products.

We have found that many customers and potential customers have decided to avoid products based on ingredient misinformation widely available and disseminated on the Internet and in fringe publications. While many outrageous claims about personal care ingredients from causing cancer to myriad other diseases for which there is not a scintilla of evidence scare stories are fond of substantiating their assertions through the crafty use of Material Safety Data Sheets, which are required to be made available to the public, and posted wherever a product containing the ingredient is used in a commercial setting. Under the hazardous data section of these documents, one will find information that states that the ingredient is irritating to eyes and skin, and can even be fatal. What these less-than-honest publications and websites don't say is that such effects may result from misuse of the product.

What consumers should know about hazard data is that it is drawn from tests using concentrations hundreds and even thousands of times more potent than the levels that would ever be found in a personal care product. In fact, ammonium lauryl sulfate is never present in personal care products at more than 1% of the total volume of ingredients.

We recommend you take a look at the Cosmetic Ingredient Review (CIR) on the safety of this ingredient when incorporated into personal care products. You can review this information yourself by using the attached link to go to the CIR website: http://www.cir-safety.org/.

PEG
PEG is polyethylene glycol, an ingredient so safe that several children's liquid medications contain polyethylene glycol in place of alcohol since most mothers do not want to give alcohol to their children. Solution of polyethylene glycol is commonly used to cleanse the bowel before gastrointestinal examination or surgery. Polyethylene glycol is considered by the FDA as a GRAS ingredient (Generally Recognized as Safe). There is no scientific or medical substantiation to suggest that PEG is harmful.

Fragrances
The various fragrances used in selected products are compounded fragrances composed of blended natural and man-made fragrance ils and synthesized into the specific aroma based upon our requirements. The fragrances used are already blended, and are compounded with RIFM (Research Institute for Fragrance Materials) approved ingredients that are free of phthalates.

Phenoxyethanol
Phenoxyethanol is used included in Hand Wash Concentrate to keep it safe and fresh. As it is the last named ingredient in the product, this means that it is present in an extremely small amount - and very safe to use. You will find the safety of this ingredient verified at the CIR website also.

For the record, Shaklee never has, does not now, and never will use ingredients that are not substantiated by factual data to be safe and efficacious. Our formulations are scientifically tested for safety and efficacy, and comply with the applicable European Union (EU) Cosmetics Directive, the Association of Southeast Asian National List (ASEAN), the California Safe Cosmetic Act, and California Proposition 65 guidelines.

Your Friends at Shaklee

I just LOVE Shaklee!!!

Cesarean; America's Favorite Surgery

C-Section Too Early Risks Baby's Health
Babies Born by Surgical Delivery Before 39 Weeks May Suffer Health Problems
By AUDREY GRAYSON
ABC News Medical Unit

Jan. 7, 2009—

When 37-year-old Alicia Cooney of Cleveland was pregnant with her first child in October 2007, her doctor expressed no concern about scheduling her Caesarian delivery, or C-section, just 38 weeks into the pregnancy.

But when Cooney became pregnant with her second child last April, her doctor was singing a different tune about when to schedule a C-section.

"I did notice a change within the hospital that they really wanted to make sure my C-section wasn't before 39 weeks," Cooney explained.

Cooney said that her doctor expressed concern about the increased risk of wet lung -- or an accumulation of fluid in the newborn's lungs -- in babies delivered by C-section before 39 weeks of gestation.

Cooney's doctor may not be alone in changing his practice in the face of these risks. On Wednesday, a new study published in the New England Journal of Medicine found that C-section delivery before 39 weeks of gestation is, indeed, linked to increased health problems for babies.

According to the National Institutes of Health, a pregnancy of normal gestation lasts about 40 weeks, with "normal" pregnancies ranging from 38 to 42 weeks.

A team of researchers lead by Dr. Alan Tita from the department of obstetrics and gynecology at the University of Alabama at Birmingham examined the results of 13,258 women who had a scheduled, repeat C-section that was planned for no other medical reason than the fact that the woman had previously had a C-section.

The researchers found that, compared to babies delivered by C-section at 39 weeks of gestation, those born at 37 or 38 weeks had a higher rate of breathing problems, blood sugar problems and serious infections. Moreover, those babies were more likely to be admitted to the neonatal intensive care unit.

"Early elected delivery is associated with adverse outcomes for the baby," Tita explained. "And the earlier you deliver, the higher it increases the risk."

These findings are in line with current recommendations by the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists (ACOG).

Yet despite the long list of potential complications associated with C-section delivery before 39 weeks, the study also found that a large number of the women studied -- 36 percent -- chose to schedule a C-section delivery before 39 weeks anyway.

"I have seen women induced or have a scheduled C-section because they have family scheduled to be in town, because they want the baby to be born on an anniversary or someone else's birthday, because they want the baby born prior to Jan. 1 for tax purposes, or because they are simply sick and tired of being pregnant," said Dr. Elaine St. John, associate professor of pediatrics in the Division of Neonatology at the University of Alabama at Birmingham.

Other experts say that the increase in C-sections before 39 weeks is due to a lack of understanding of the dangers associated with elective late pre-term birth.

"Most women think the risks to their babies are the same whether the babies are delivered four, three, two or one week before the baby is due," explained Dr. Sessions Cole, director of the Division of Newborn Medicine at the St. Louis Children's Hospital. "This study should help mothers understand that there are significant risks to their babies associated with elective late preterm birth."

Patient Pressure Figures Big

Approximately 30 percent of all babies born in the United States are delivered by C-section. A study published in April 2005 in the journal Obstetrics and Gynecology found that elective C-sections accounted for about 28 percent of all C-sections performed in the U.S. in 2001.

However, many experts report a growing trend toward encouraging women not to schedule an elective C-section before 39 weeks at hospitals all over the country.

"The recommendations for years have been to avoid elective delivery of any kind until after 39 weeks," said Dr. Lisa Jones, a gynecologist at the New Bedford Community Health Center in New Bedford, Mass. "So all this study really does is reinforce what we already knew."

Still, some experts say that the power of maternal insistence in scheduling an early C-section is enough to convince many doctors to go along with their patient's wishes.

"I think the practice of early [C-section delivery] will only end if hospitals ban the practice," Holzman said. "There is little reason for [obstetricians] to stop since they are often pressured by patients."

The study also outlines some of the risks women must consider when opting to deliver by C-section after 39 weeks.

According to Tita, one such risk is having an unexplained stillbirth while waiting for the 39-week-mark to deliver. This risk is very small, but Tita said that it is still best for women to follow ACOG recommendations by waiting the full 39 weeks before delivering by C-section.

Early Surgical Delivery Sometimes Appropriate

There are, however, certain instances in which an early delivery is appropriate.

"If there [are] firm medical indications of risk to the mother's or fetus's ... health [such as] worsening maternal high blood pressure [or] lack of fetal responsiveness ... then delivery is indicated," Cole explained. "However, the risks of these conditions should be weighed against the risks described by this study."

Moreover, Holzman said, "For most of these [conditions], the risks to the fetus in delaying [delivery] are well known and predictable."

Many experts ultimately hope that this study will prove to the public that the risks of early C-section delivery greatly outweigh the benefits in most cases.

"Hopefully articles like this will help educate the general public and fewer babies will be placed at risk in the future," said Dr. Patricia Chess, associate professor of pediatrics at the University of Rochester Medical Center.

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