Does anyone have any other ideas to mitigate exposure?
I guess the proper thing to do would be to use big over-the-ear headphones and cover the cushions with fabric.
Tinfoil is a good alternative, with the added benefit that it can also protect from other things /s
It's also not a new technology you know, it has been used for decades in hearing aids
I'm not worried about bone conduction, I feel that open ear is much safer than closed ear because I can eg hear a smoke alarm or hear a housemate fall and cry out for help. If there were evidence it caused brain damage or something then I would stop using them but I don't think there is. I try to regularly turn my volume down below where I can hear it and then turn it one click up to mitigate damage to my hearing. That's definitely a real risk but that's not specific to bone conduction.
The study names brands like Bose, Panasonic, Samsung, and Sennheiser. What about Apple airpods? Anyone knows what's that made of and if they've got any harmful effects?
But then, I wouldn't worry about headphones at all. You probably sleep on a mattress made from polyurethane foam that contains plasticizers and fire retardants in much greater quantities. The same goes for your car seats, and they off-gas a lot more when parked in the sun. You'd probably need to eat 1,000 earbuds to match that.
AirPods were rated "green" across all three of their test categories.
with rigorous avoidance you can hope to reduce the amount in your body by like ~50% apparently but you can't get rid of it all because it's everywhere. unless you live off grid self-sustained and grow your own vegetables and have no plastic in your environment. so im not sure how much of a concern this study is or not.
How about the running shoes? That must have much more chemicals and adhesives although I don't have data for that.
"These chemicals are not just additives; they may be migrating from the headphones into our body," said Karolina Brabcová, chemical expert at Arnika. "Daily use—especially during exercise when heat and sweat are present—accelerates this migration directly to the skin. Although there is no immediate health risk, long-term exposures, especially vulnerable groups like teenagers, are of great concern. There is no 'safe' level for endocrine disruptors that mimic our natural hormones."
Can someone knowledgeable comment on this? It seems extreme to say there's no safe level.
There's a safe amount of cyanide (apple seeds), radiation (everywhere), safe speed of a bullet flying at you (if I just throw it gently at you) and so on. Even if the cyanide is technically poisoning you, the radiation from bananas is damaging you and the bullet I threw lightly grazed your skin, it's still safe in practical terms.
Plus absorption through the skin is worse than oral. Because when you eat it your liver breaks a lot of it down. When it goes in the skin it bypasses all that.
"Up to 351 mg/kg of bisphenols detected—35× higher than proposed EU limits"
There is far more data available in the orginal report:
https://arnika.org/en/publications/the-sound-of-contaminatio...
https://www.thestandard.com.hk/health/article/324892/Europea...
There are options available on major e-commerce sites. The ones I choose have a stainless steel nozzle and are supposed to enhance the sound reproduction.
If you're worried about your headphones, wait till you start thinking about the fabrics you're wearing that have plastic in them.
If I was going to try and limit exposure I'd start there, my headphones wouldn't be high on my list.
BTW I don't know anything about the subject, so I mainly look for internal consistency and specific, accurate factual claims as evidence for credibility.
I'd much rather they focus their energy on the more ubiquitous sources of exposure to endocrine disrupting materials in our environment (plastic packaging, plastic bottles, can linings, mattresses and clothing for example).
There's no harm in sharing information and any awareness gained is always worthwhile. We're all free to draw our own conclusions at that point.
Apologies for the confusion on that aspect.
While it would probably be preferable to reduce the plastic in your life in general (I’m converting as much as I can to platinum silicone from reputable sources) that might not be possible for everyone.
In the meantime, if you buy nylon or polyester clothing you should see what their policies are https://corporate.lululemon.com/~/media/Files/L/Lululemon/ou...
"Hazardous substances found in all headphones tested by ToxFREE project" : https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47058426
No single pair is “bad” for you at the moment.
So the action you can take is email/contact your elected officials so this can be on their radar for new policy.
Are there BPA-free headphones on the market?
1. There are no EU-wide regulations restricting on BPA concentrations in electronics devices.
2. The ECHA has proposed for limits is 10mg/kg which is also used for the OEKO-TEX Standard 100.
3. In the study's evaluation criteria, for parts to achieve a green rating for bisphenols, the concentration has be below 0.8mg/kg for parts touching the skin and below 10mg/kg for parts not touching the skin.
4. 69% of the tested samples achieved a green rating for bisphenols.
So while there is a gap in regulations ensuring a safe baseline for electronics, the majority of the tested headphones are doing okay as far as bisphenol exposure even under the proposed guidelines.
I use SteelSeries Arctis 1 which wasn't tested. The Arctis Nova 5 scored "red" for parts touching the skin though, so...
To sort, click the Table 1 icon and select Create filter view.
Although, they still have silicone tips and the wood is probably treated with some kind of varnish for durability and aesthetics, so...
1. Microplastics are pervasive and would be very hard to remediate
2. They seem to bioaccumulate over years, and potentially even transmit intergenerationally
3. We have mechanistic evidence of them interfering with some rather critical biological processes, but processes that would yield chronic issues rather than acute ones
All of this makes it both very important and very difficult to understand the relationship between dosages and possible health effects.
- Headphones marketed towards children. (children are most vulnerable as they are developing)
- Chemicals released "especially during exercise when heat and sweat are present." (teens who exercise and are fit/strong/threatening)
It's disturbing how prevalent forever chemicals are.
Every time I've seen some child's toy or device and the idea "This would be a perfect way to target children to disrupt their hormones" came to my cynical, paranoid mind... After a little bit of investigation, I found it's full of endocrine disruptors!
E.g. I bought a small inflatable swimming pool for my toddler son and I noticed how he was putting his mouth on the sides and I thought "Would be a perfect way to deliver endocrine disruptors to toddlers" - So I did some searching, contacted the manufacturer; surprise; it's full of phthalates but they claim 'within approved regulatory limits'!
Then I saw my son's toothbrush had some blue rubber behind to 'scrub the tongue'; it had some cartoon characters on it to appeal to children and I though to myself "That would be a perfect way to get some endocrine disruptors directly into children's mouths on a daily basis"... I did a search and guess what? Do I need to say it, you conspiracy theorist!?
Now this story about children's headphones...
Now consider all this in the context of declining sperm counts and media narratives which conveniently frame population control as the main solution.
I think one of the main problems is that regulations don't work. Under a capitalist system, the government cannot monitor everything that is being sold on the 'free market' or else it's not a free market anymore. The only way to have a functioning capitalist system is by getting rid of regulations and instead replace them with HARSH punishment. No more 'limited liability' bs! If a corporation does something bad; everyone should be fined, including the shareholders! You didn't know? Too bad! You should have done your research! I'm a dumb consumer and even I could figure out that the product contains endocrine disruptors!
It's just insane that we let it come to this. Bring back full liability! Just jail for executives and a fine for shareholders would help a lot.
As always, the more parsimonious answer is that plastic is cheap and that nobody is incentivized to determine the long term cost of usage/exposure. You don’t need a conspiracy to explain the outcomes here; profit motive suffices.
What is more likely? That there's a grand conspiracy involving thousands of people to chemically pacify the population. Or that products made with plastic are cheap and easy to make.
Does adding an endocrine-disrupting 'tongue scraper' to children's toothbrush actually lower costs? Does this feature even add any value at all to the product? Why not clean the tongue with the bristles! The feature doesn't seem to justify the cost. All I can see is added marketing 'value'.
Also, people like to draw a distinction between "There is an intentional conspiracy by government officials to disrupt children's hormones" vs "Government officials know that children's hormones are being disrupted and they not only let it happen, they give the official seal of approval to the products, certifying their safety, when they are provably not safe in the aggregate if you look at population health statistics."
From my perspective, both cases are malicious and I don't see the point of trying to figure out which one is the case! It's a discussion of lesser evils and it seems like a deflection.
It's a conspiracy either way; in the second case, it's a conspiracy of neglect. A conspiracy of people getting paid to do nothing about a problem that they're claiming to be preventing! In the very best light, it's a false solution which acts as a placeholder for a real solution.
Why pacified? I don't really have "conspiracy theory" about this (as in, I don't think there's a group doing it intentionally), but I've idly wondered if the state of the world could be partially explained by things like microplastics and plastic chemicals leeching into our bodies. Kind of like the leaded gasoline/increased crime hypothesis.
