These were\u00a0widely used in plastic items with electrical componants<\/a>\u00a0including domestic appliances like cookers and kettles, electronics like TVs and computers, and especially electric heaters.<\/p>\n Their use was later extended to other items such as household furniture, vehicles, building insulation and even some children\u2019s products, such as changing mats and cot mattresses. These FRs work by starving a fire of oxygen for a short time, allowing us time to fight a fire\u00a0before it gets out of control<\/a>.<\/p>\n But, like for other chemicals such as pesticides\u00a0and asbestos<\/a>, research caught up with the most widely used FRs in the early 2000s and found that the benefits of these chemicals may be outweighed by the dangers. These FRs\u00a0leach out during everyday activities<\/a>, particularly from soft and flexible items like beds, couches and blankets.<\/p>\n Simply using these items<\/a>\u00a0is enough to make FRs leach into indoor air and dust where we can inhale or ingest them, or\u00a0even absorb them through our skin<\/a>. Research has shown these chemicals have\u00a0hazardous properties<\/a>\u00a0when enough is absorbed into our bodies. For example, they have been shown to be carcinogenic and can lead to infertility.<\/p>\n Legacy flame retardants<\/strong><\/p>\n Some of these FRs were\u00a0banned for use in these kinds of products<\/a>. But there is a danger from both legacy FRs still in circulation as well as so-called \u201cemerging FRs\u201d that replaced the banned chemicals.<\/p>\n New FRs, with slightly different properties to banned ones, are being introduced all the time. This is because, in many cases, regulations in the UK and Ireland require furniture products to meet fire-retardancy standards. The cheapest way is by using additive FRs.<\/p>\n Our\u00a0recent research project<\/a>, conducted by the University of Birmingham and the University of Galway, highlighted how these chemicals are still widely present in consumer goods. The research found restricted FRs in roughly half of the household furniture items we analysed. They were also prominently found in household electronics and building insulation foams.<\/p>\n When these items are recycled, we would hope that these banned harmful chemicals are removed from circulation. However, these chemicals are\u00a0very difficult to remove from waste<\/a>. Approximately 10% of hazardous waste containing restricted FRs goes into the recycling stream.<\/p>\n Research shows that products\u00a0made from recycled materials<\/a>\u00a0contain banned FRs at relatively low concentrations. Banned FRs have been found in electronics, furniture and polystyrene packaging foams, but also,\u00a0more worryingly<\/a>, children\u2019s toys, kitchen utensils and food packaging.<\/p>\n The low concentrations of banned FRs in these products are consistent with leftovers from recycled waste rather than deliberate treatment.<\/p>\n Additionally, almost all the mattresses, furniture and vehicle foams we investigated for our research project contained emerging FRs, which research shows have\u00a0similar hazards to their banned predecessors<\/a>.<\/p>\n Unlike the UK and Ireland, most of Europe does not have such stringent furniture fire safety standards. However,\u00a0we do not see significantly fewer<\/a>\u00a0fires or fire-related fatalities in the UK and Ireland.<\/p>\n Irish government\u00a0data suggests that other factors<\/a>\u00a0such as the indoor smoking ban, requirements for smoke alarms in all rooms, reduced numbers of open fires in homes, and increased fire safety awareness have contributed more to the decrease in fire fatalities in Ireland over the last 20 years than FRs.<\/p>\n The recently published European Chemicals Agency (ECHA)\u00a0strategy on FRs<\/a>\u00a0outlines the EU\u2019s road map for removing hazardous FRs from circulation. It specifically cites the UK\u2019s and Ireland\u2019s stringent furniture foam fire safety standards as one of the reasons FRs are so prevalent in the EU market.<\/p>\n No one likes the idea of fires in their homes. But the amount of time a fire is slowed by these FRs is in the order of seconds.<\/p>\n In Ireland,\u00a0the majority of fatalities<\/a>\u00a0from fires happen overnight, meaning people aren\u2019t awake to take advantage of the few extra seconds before fire takes hold. The smoke produced by\u00a0burning FR-treated items<\/a>\u00a0is also more toxic compared to non-FR- treated materials, leading to increased risk of asphyxiation, the leading cause of death from fires.<\/p>\n Know the risks<\/strong><\/p>\n Few people are aware that these chemical additives are in so many items and fewer still know the hazards they pose. At the moment, it is difficult to know which FRs are used where and at what concentrations.<\/p>\n There should, at the very least, be a more robust labelling system which outlines exactly what chemicals are in these items so that consumers can make informed decisions. Not all products contain FRs but it\u2019s hard for consumers to tell because manufacturers only have to state whether safety standards have been met, now how they have been met.<\/p>\n We need to ask ourselves: are these additive chemicals worth it? New FRs can be developed faster than research can determine their toxicity, making it difficult to tell how safe they really are.<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.fie.undef.edu.ar\/ceptm\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/11\/pintor.jpg\")