The 21st Century Magazine,at South Florida's www.miami-dade-online.com.
The 21st Century Magazine,
at South Florida's www.miami-dade-online.com.
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ARE CANDLES POISONING YOUR FAMILY? Nancy Hopkins, February 6, 2001
Candles with lead in their wick to allow for longer burning may result in lead concentrations in
the air that can be as high as 33X greater than the Federal Government says are safe. And that
lead in the air will fall as dust to be further inhaled and ingested. Even moderate lead poisoning
in children can damage the central nervous system, kidneys and reproductive systems. Low
levels of lead exposure can decrease intelligence, impair neurobehavioral development,
decrease stature and growth, and impair hearing acuity. These dire conclusions come form the
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. It only takes 3 hours of burning a lead-wicked candle to get
these dangerous concentrations according to a Public Citizen study.
This situation has been known since the 1970's when a warning was issued by the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC) about candles containing lead-core wicks. At that time, the National Candle Association, with a membership manufacturing 95 percent of the candles in the U.S., made an agreement to stop using lead in candlewicks.
The Public Citizen's Health Research Group recently estimated that millions of lead-wicked candles are still being sold in the U.S. every year. This watchdog group, Public Citizen has petitioned the CPSC to totally ban candles carrying lead-wicks.
You can peel back some of the cotton of the wicks to see if there is a metal
support wire running through the center. Because there is no accepted way
to absolutely tell if your candles are safe if there is a metal core to the wick,
DO NOT USE ANY CANDLE WITH A METAL WICK unless you have full
knowledge that it does not contain lead.
Sources:
Consumer Product Safety Commission, http://www.cpsc.gov/
Public Citizen, http://www.citizen.org/
National Candle Association, http://www.candles.org/
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, http://www.cdc.gov/
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