Oxford Coalition for Social Justice looking for federal government to ban chemical found in many antibacterial soaps/cosmetics.
OXFORD COUNTY - Oxford Coalition for Social Justice is calling on the federal government to ban Triclosan.
President Bryan Smith says it's a chemical product, used in many personal and cleaning products.
"It gets in the water system and what they've detected is that it's everywhere in the water system as well. So it's in ground water and in streams and it poses a risk to wildlife obviously but it also poses a risk to human beings because it's a hormone disrupter which means it messes with your gender." Not only that but Smith says it can make you sick. "Because it's everywhere in our environment and it's an antibacterial agent, it works like what happens when you use antibiotics and over use them and over use them. The bacteria adapt to them and develop these super bacteria that are resistant to all the kinds of treatment that we have."
Over 50 public interest and not-for-profit groups across the Country and the United States are also asking the federal government to take action.
Smith says they want the federal government to ban it outright in all products marketed in Canada.
"There's a whole lot of science that has been done on it and the Canadian Environmental Law Association has accessed and they're saying it would be relatively simple for our government to move to ban it. It's time they did so. In fact, it was time awhile ago."
Smith says while there is no formal petition he knows of asking for the ban, he says locals can get involved by choosing not to purchase products with the word 'antibacterial'.
He says "It is only sensible for us in Oxford County to want to eliminate an avoidable contaminant from our water when we want to prevent other contamination from entering via Walker’s proposed dump. The federal government can and should be protecting us from all of these."

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