What's that new shower curtain smell? Toxic chemicals!

By Lois Marie Gibbs

Have you ever opened a new vinyl shower curtain in your home and caught a whiff of that nasty odor? I know I have. After my son opened a new curtain in his college dorm I began to wonder about the chemicals being released from that new shower curtain smell. Unfortunately, that new shower curtain smell may be toxic to your health according to new laboratory testing that found one new vinyl shower curtain can release over 100 chemicals into the air. Some of these chemicals can cause cancer, and adversely affect the respiratory and reproductive systems.

As a mother of four children, it concerns me.

We need your help to get toxic chemicals out of products in our homes by signing the Petition for PVC-Free Shower Curtains.

If there is even the slightest risk that any health harm can come to any child from these products, doesn't it just make common sense to use products where no question of risk exists? It's just a mom's good common sense.

Believe me, I know what I'm talking about. I have decades of experience battling toxic contamination and the dangers that exposure to them can cause.

I raised my family in Niagara Falls, NY at Love Canal, one of our nation's most infamous toxic dumps. My children's school was built on top of 20,000 tons of toxic chemicals, contaminated with dioxins and other dangerous chemicals. Thankfully, other concerned parents and I organized ourselves fought to get relocated out of that contaminated community by the federal government 30 years ago.

Since Love Canal, concerned moms across the country are waking up to the fact that toxic chemicals aren't only found in dioxin-laden dumps, but are also found in everyday consumer products such as children's toys, cosmetics, and even baby bottles. Now we learn vinyl shower curtains are even polluting the air inside our homes.

You can read the new study here, and if you're concerned like me, sign the Petition for PVC-Free Shower Curtains.

Help us ensure our children grow up in safe and healthy homes.

Lois Marie Gibbs is the founder and Executive Director of the Center for Health, Environment and Justice (CHEJ). Researchers at CHEJ authored Volatile Vinyl - the New Shower Curtain's Chemical Smell.

To read the new report, visit: report