Since it was adopted by voters in 1986, Prop 65 has protected millions of California children and
families –and millions more worldwide-- from harmful chemicals. Below, just a few examples from
CEH’s Prop 65 work that has resulted in significant changes making life safer for everyday people.
Lead-Tainted Children’s Jewelry
Jarnell Brown was a typical, happy toddler. Like a lot of toddlers, he would
sometimes put things in his mouth, and one day he found a charm from a
neighbor’s bracelet and accidentally swallowed it. No one knew, so by the
time he was sick enough to take to the hospital, it was too late. It turns out
that the charm he swallowed was nearly 100% lead, and Darnell died from
acute lead poisoning.
When CEH began investigation high levels of lead in children’s jewelry, it was
common for us to find items that were 80, 90, even 100% lead. One study
found that half of the children’s jewelry tested had high levels of lead. Our
Prop 65 lawsuits ended the use of lead and cadmium in jewelry for children, and set state and national
standards for adult jewelry. Our more recent testing of thousands of pieces of jewelry showed that the
industry changed dramatically: more than 95% of the pieces tested following our Prop 65 legal
agreements were safer, without any lead or cadmium problems.
Child Care Nap Mats
Beatriz Leyva-Cutler is the Executive Director of Centro VIDA bilingual child
care centers. The safety of the children in her care is her first priority, so when
she heard about toxic flame retardants in some nap mats, she wanted
answers and solutions. She knew that flame retardants can cause cancer,
genetic damage, harm to the bodies’ natural hormones and other serious
health problems.
But the nap mat makers wouldn’t answer her questions. “We were getting the
run-around from the nap mat companies,” she says. Fortunately, Beatriz had
heard that some nap mat companies had violated Prop 65. She contacted
CEH, which had launched Prop 65 legal actions against the nap mat companies. With CEH’s help, she was
able to identify sources for safer nap mats for the children in her centers, and she shared the
information with her wide circle of colleagues in the child care community.
Ultimately CEH reached legal agreements with the leading makers of nap mats calling on them to end
their use of toxic flame retardant chemicals in nap mats sold to child care centers nationwide.
Imported Candies
For years, communities across California, especially in
Latino neighborhoods, were plagued by imported
candies from Mexico that were tainted with high levels
of lead. State health officials had no way to stop the
inflow of the products, but could only issue recalls after
they found problem candies already on store shelves.
The Environmental Health Coalition and CEH joined the
Attorney General in legal action that won a landmark
agreement with major companies, including divisions of
Mars and Hershey, that bans the sale of lead-tainted
candies.
Baby Bibs
Like a lot of infants, Marilyn Furer’s grandson Jensen liked to
chew on his baby bib. But Marilyn had heard about Prop 65
lawsuits that exposed high levels of lead in many vinyl products,
so she wondered if the baby’s vinyl bib could also pose a lead
poisoning threat. Marilyn tried asking state authorities to check
on the problem but no one would follow-up on her complaint.
So she contacted CEH. Our investigation led to Walmart and
Toys R Us initiating nationwide recalls of their vinyl baby bibs,
and ultimately ended the sale of lead-tainted vinyl baby bibs by
major retailers nationwide.
Lead in Lunchboxes
When California’s “First 5” program offered free lunch boxes to children
across the state, there was just one problem. When one child brought
her lunchbox to a free CEH testing event, we found high levels of lead in
the vinyl lunchbox. Our work ultimately revealed the problem in more
than 100,000 lunchboxes that had been given to California children, and
resulted in an industry-wide agreement that ended the threat of lead
poisoning from all kids’ lunchboxes. For several years CEH worked with
First5 and other state agencies to conduct free testing of lunchboxes,
backpacks and other products, to insure that the products were safe
before they were sourced for state programs, potentially saving the
state millions in costs from further recalls of dangerous products.