Members of the House Energy and Commerce Committee are reviewing critical language in a bill that as presently drafted would ban only the sale and distribution of microbead-containing facial scrubs and other personal care products, but not the manufacture of such products, say ISSA reports.

“Our intent is to seek to ban manufacturing along with sale and distribution,” stated Rep. Frank Pallone (D-N.J.), the committee's ranking member and author of the Microbead-Free Waters Act of 2015 (H.R. 1321).

The House Energy and Commerce Subcommittee on Health approved H.R. 1321 on a voice vote on May 14. The bill as currently written would require the Food and Drug Administration to ban the sale and distribution of personal care products containing synthetic microbeads, starting Jan. 1, 2018. The bill is currently silent on the question of manufacture, but Pallone promised that “we are going to address manufacturing and sale” as the bill makes its way through the full committee.

Plastic microbeads are smaller than 5 millimeters and elude capture by wastewater treatment plants. They can act as sponges for more toxic chemicals and endocrine disruptors, such as mercury and bisphenol A.

ISSA reports that Pallone is not alone in wanting to ban the manufacture of personal care products, which use plastic microbeads as abrasives.  Committee Chairman Fred Upton (R-Mich.), the bill's chief sponsor, also has indicated that he is working on language to phase-out manufacturing and sales of such products that include plastic microbeads, which researchers have found in large quantities in the Great Lakes.

Both Upton and Pallone are treating the microbeads bill as a priority. Pallone said he hopes to see movement on the bill in Congress during the session that starts following Labor Day.

A companion bill (S. 1424) was introduced May 21 by Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand (D-N.Y.). That bill also seeks to ban distribution and sale of personal care products containing microbeads.

‘Pragmatic' Approach Supported by Industry.  The Personal Care Products Council, which represents about 600 large, medium and small-sized companies that manufacture and distribute the vast majority of cosmetic and personal care products marketed in the country, has endorsed the concept of a federal legislation that establishes “pragmatic” phase-out deadlines for synthetic microbeads that are found not only in personal care products but also in over-the-counter pharmaceutical drugs.

Meanwhile, in California, lawmakers have sent state legislation to Gov. Jerry Brown (D) that would ban the sale of personal care products containing plastic microbeads, beginning Jan. 1, 2020.

Passed by the Assembly on a final vote of 64-12 and sent to the governor on Sept. 8, A.B. 888 would make California the ninth state to impose restrictions on the use of the tiny synthetic particles in facial scrubs, body washes, soaps and toothpastes.

Typically used as exfoliates or colorants, plastic microbeads aren't captured by wastewater treatment systems.  As a result, they end up being discharged to local waterways absorbing toxic pollutants in the process.  The microbeads containing toxins then pose a threat to marine life and potentially to those that consume fish that ingest the particles.

Colorado, Connecticut, Illinois, Indiana, Maine, Maryland, New Jersey and Wisconsin have all enacted legislation restricting the use of plastic microbeads in personal care products.

Meanwhile, some personal care product manufacturers, including Unilever PLC, the Body Shop, Johnson & Johnson, Beiersdorf, L'Oreal and Procter & Gamble, have agreed to phase out the use of microbeads within a few years.

For more information on microbeads:
Affect of micro bead legislation
States limiting micorbead sales
Problem with micorbeads
Alternative to microbeads
Microbeads are polluting water