globalresearchers

Homework #9

Due: Wednesday, April 8th, by 8:00am

Instructions for Homework #9. The bullet points below are informational steps. The numbers 1.-18. are the questions you will answer for your submission.

· Open the following web page: http://www.ewg.org/

· Be aware that many of the links, and the home page of the EWG.ORG’s sites have a pop-up which is sometimes difficult to remove. Be patient and look for a way to close it so that you can continue to work through this homework.

· You are first going to open the link titled EWG’s SKIN DEEP GUIDE TO COSMETICS

· Find the link for Skin Care and hover your mouse’s pointer over it. A drop down list will appear. Click on the link for bar soap. A list will be generated on your page which contains information on over 1,800 bar soaps. They are organized with scores ranging from 0 to 8.

1. Please provide all of the pertinent information about the Hazard Score. You can obtain this information by clicking on the green zero:

· Now click on the score image with the down arrow: This will rearrange the scores from ascending to descending.

2. What is the name of the product with the lowest score? And what is that score?

· Now open in a new tab the following link: http://www.myvitabath.com/bar-soap/

· You should arrive at the product information page for vitabath. On this page, click on the product that you saw on the EWG.ORG site.

3. Please read the Product Description, then copy and paste the Product Description from this page for question #3

· Go back to the EWG’s Skin Deep page and click on the underlined product name: Vitabath Moisturizing Gelee Soap, Original .

4. What are the 5 ingredient concerns? And what is their associated risk level?

5. Scroll down under Ingredient Concerns and read the information tied to RETINYL ACETATE (VITAMIN A ACETATE), then copy and paste the information listed as Concerns for question #5.

6. Write an opinion based paragraph concerning the difference between what you read on the product description page and what you read as an ingredient concern. Thoughts to consider: How do you feel about this? Is it ethical for this soap company to sell this product? Who do you think is their target market? What type of message does the packaging send? Does it line up with the information available from EWG.ORG?

· Find the link near the top of the page for Sun and hover your mouse’s pointer over it. A drop down list will appear. Click on the “Sunscreen: SPF greater than 30. Adjust the scoring from ascending to descending again with the score image and down arrow:.

· Scroll down to #8: Baby Blanket Continuous Spray Lotion Sunscreen for Babies, SPF 50+ (2013 formulation)

7. What are the 5 ingredient concerns? And what is their associated risk level?

8. Scroll down under Ingredient Concerns and read the information tied to OXYBENZONE(Active Ingredient) then copy and paste the information listed as Concerns for question #8.

9. Briefly…Assume that one day you will have children. Would you ever want to use this product on your child? Is there appropriate information provided by this web site to definitively state that there is a significant risk?

· Click on the back button of your browser or return to http://www.ewg.org/.

· Click on the link for EWG’s FOOD SCORES.

· Click on the Categories tab with the double down arrow:

· Click on the Frozen Food Tab and select Frozen Pizza from the drop down list.

· From the next set of frozen pizza sub categories, select Frozen Pepperoni and Other Meat Pizzas (mmmm my favorite food as a starving college student).

· Click on the down arrow associated with the Sorted by Score (1 to 10) button: and change the setting to “by Score (10 to 1)”.

· Near the bottom of this page you will find Totino's Party Pizza, Triple Pepperoni [10.2 oz] . I recall this pizza only costing a dollar back in the good old days.

· The food categories have different rating information than skin products you researched earlier.

10. What are the categories of concern identified for Totino’s Party Pizza? How did this pizza rate under these three categories?

· Down lower on the page you will find EWG’s Top Findings. The third one down, indicated by a red negative symbol, you will find information on EWG’s top food additives of concern. The information link is not working, but a search of the additive Butylated Hydroxyanisole (BHA) , could lead you to the following link: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Butylated_hydroxyanisole Read through this page.

11. What has the state of California done with respect to this specific food additive? Would you want to eat this pizza?

· Wow! Let’s look at a health frozen pizza option to make you feel better. Click the back button on your browser. On the left hand side of the page you can “Refine search” below here click the empty box next to Certified organic (5). The results should still be sorted descending. Let’s look at the first pizza to come up. Save A Lot Pizza [10 oz] If you click on this pizza you should be able to find proof that this pizza is in fact, USDA Certified Organic and Certified Non-GMO.

12. USDA Certified Organic and Certified Non-GMO should mean healthy. Right? What parts of this pizza, even though it has such great certifications, caused it to have such a high score?

13. Would you want to eat this pizza?

14. Does the information about this pizza change your opinion of the Totino’s Party Pizza?

· Return to the original home page for EWG.ORG: http://www.ewg.org/

· Open the link for EWG’S GUIDE TO HEALTHY CLEANING

· Scroll down the page and look to the left hand side of the page to find a Products List.

· Since many of you might live in dorms, you may not have access to, or need of, bathroom or kitchen cleaning supplies. However, we will assume that you are all responsible for doing your own laundry.

· Click on the Laundry tab.

· Select Laundry Detergent with Fabric Softener

· You should see a list of “How the Products Ranked”

· Click on the link

· Click on the product: Tide Ultra plus a Touch of Downy Powder Detergent, Clean Breeze you want your clothes to have that clean breeze smell after all.

· First of all you should notice that these products also have a unique scoring or grading system.

15. Please provide any pertinent information about the scoring system used for cleaning products. You can find this information by clicking on the red letter F:

· Under the Ingredients list and the Health, Environment, and Disclosure Concerns list look through these scores and information.

16. Look up PEG-400 on this page. The information listed as “Some Concern” looks awfully frightening, but the grade is only a “C”. In your opinion is should “cancer” be “some concern”? How do you think this information should be expressed? Would you use this product knowing what you now know?

· You have researched some of the worst of the worst products documented by EWG.ORG.

· Now research the food and products you use.

17. Fill out the table (on the following page) by doing some research on your own. Please make sure to include specific product name information. If there is a product category you don’t use, select something similar and applicable that you do use. Notice we tried to select products that everyone uses and stayed away from things like make-up or shaving cream. However, if you found this information valuable you are encouraged to do some additional research.

17. The Table:

The soap you use in the shower	The grade or score that this product received and why	One import piece of information about this product that you think all consumers should be made aware of	Will you continue to use this product? Why or Why Not?
The sunscreen you use	The grade or score that this product received and why	One import piece of information about this product that you think all consumers should be made aware of	Will you continue to use this product? Why or Why Not?
A frozen food you eat	The grade or score that this product received and why	One import piece of information about this product that you think all consumers should be made aware of	Will you continue to use this product? Why or Why Not?
A laundry detergent product you eat	The grade or score that this product received and why	One import piece of information about this product that you think all consumers should be made aware of	Will you continue to use this product? Why or Why Not?

18. Similar to question #5 above. Please write a well though opinion based paper about what you have learned from this homework (no greater than 1 page please). Topics to consider in this opinion paper are: Ethics, Marketing Strategies and Packaging, Labeling and Certifications, Risk, Exposure, Consideration of “Who” uses specific products. i.e. babies, elderly, developing young adults, etc., Changes in exposure to toxic chemicals and changes in global health trends as reported by the Center for Disease Control for the last 50 years: http://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/preview/mmwrhtml/su6004a16.htm and whatever else you feel is important.

Submit only the questions and answers from this homework that have numbers (the table is #17). Do not include all of the text, images, or links that were provided to you as bullet points. Save this as a “word document” file and upload it to BBL no later than Wednesday, April 8th, by 8:00am.