The Plastic Project Part 3: What's In Your Tampons?

A new video ad from Seventh Generation has green ladies everywhere buzzing about what, exactly, goes into those little tubes of cotton that most of us find pretty indispensable several days each month.

Since I'm spending so much time in the bathroom this week anyway, I decided to find out. According to Seventh Generation:

... conventional tampons are commonly made from a blend of cotton and rayon. Rayon is typically treated with chlorine dioxide, which can result in dangerous chlorinated toxins being released into the environment. And conventional cotton is typically grown using pesticides.

It's a claim backed up by British feminine hygiene brand Natracare, who has been making 100% certified organic cotton tampons for years now, and are available in the USA at Whole Foods, Wild Oats, some other drug stores and grocery stores and most natural food stores. But while I trust both of these companies, I wanted to make sure their positions were backed up by um, experts on chemicals in consumer goods who don't also sell consumer goods.

It turns out, a lot of our go-to green gurus are rather shy on the topic of feminine hygiene (to which I say, time to grow up boys, it doesn't get much more Mother Nature than this!). But the Natural Resources Defense Council confirms that it's wise to avoid chlorinated bleach paper products of all kinds, noting:

When chlorine is used to bleach paper, the process can also result in the formation of harmful chemicals such as dioxins and furans, which are known to cause cancer in humans. The safest paper bleaching processes are totally chlorine-free (TCF) or processed chlorine-free (PCF). See the list below for detailed explanations.

Sierra Club seconds that position, advising us to choose tampons and pads that are "marked as 100% USDA Organic and contain the Leaping Bunny Logo which is used to identify various items as free of animal testing." To be clear: The concern is not so much that you'll be absorbing dioxins through your tampons (there's far more in the average hamburger). But if consumers buy less products made via chlorinated bleaching, it will help cut down on how much of this stuff we're circulating throughout the environment.

And of course, while I'm on my no plastic kick, it's worth noting how much plastic goes in to tampons: 96-97% of American women use tampons with applicators, many of which are plastic. These bad boys made headlines last year when they started washing up on the shores of Halifax. Plus, many no-applicator tampons (I'm looking at you, o.b.) come individually wrapped in the kind of immediately-disposed-of plastic that goes straight to a landfill near you.

So organic cotton, plastic-free tampons are one good option. If you want to be really green, reusable cloth pads or cups like the Diva Cup may be the most eco-friendly options of all, says Elizabeth Arveda Kissling, PhD, author of Capitalizing on the Curse: The Business of Menstruation.