The manufacture of school supplies is not sufficiently supervised and potentially dangerous components are found in many of them, believes the association UFC-Que Choisir, which asks parents in particular to avoid buying pens.
The consumer protection association “advises parents not to buy pens for their children given the cocktail of harmful substances found in all the references analyzed,” it said in a press release published on Thursday.
Potentially Hazardous Components
A few days before the start of the school year, the association has indeed tested some thirty school products (pens, markers or highlighters) and concludes that almost half of them include potentially dangerous components.
These are “reprotoxic phthalates and endocrine disruptors, carcinogenic impurities, polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons, isothiazolinones, benzyl alcohol, toluene and benzene,” the association lists.
It is known that these components can cause multiple pathologies ranging from allergies to cancer, even if this risk remains theoretical in the absence of studies on the possible concrete consequences on the health of students.
“A European regulation as lax as it is omnipresent”
However, the risk is taken seriously enough by the health authorities that one of them, the National Health Security Agency (Anses), becomes concerned about it at the beginning of the summer. On the basis of the work which also included previous tests of UFC-Que Choisir, he considered that the legislation was insufficient both at the French and European level.
He had asked to align European legislation with that in force for toys, much more restrictive, taking up a request already expressed for a long time by the UFC-Que Choisir. The latter reiterated it during his test on Thursday, judging that it demonstrated the insufficiency of the current regulations, and asking France to take the issue to a European level.
“Almost none of these products is illegal in terms of their composition due to European regulations as lax as they are grotesque,” he judges.
One exception, however: a pen bought at a B&M chain store already appears illegal, according to the association, which calls for its immediate withdrawal.
Source: BFM TV
