Mouthrinses Awash in Controversy
Posted by Michael Bradbury in Consumer Safety, Diseases, Health and Medicine, SciClips, Video on 09 25th, 2009 | 2 responses
New research coming from Johnson & Johnson shows that Listerine antiseptic not only kills germs that cause bad breath and gum disease but also could prevent those germs from entering the bloodstream where they can lead to diabetes, heart disease and pneumonia.
This follows on the heels of an Australian study showing “sufficient evidence” that alcohol-containing mouthwashes–including Listerine–may be associated with a greater risk of mouth cancer.
So the question remains, is this 120-year-old health product both helping and harming us?
2 Responses to “Mouthrinses Awash in Controversy”
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The benefit studies are usually short term.
Here are studies claiming that there may be a risk:
http://www3.interscience.wiley.com/cgi-bin/fulltext/121540201/HTMLSTART?CRETRY=1&SRETRY=0
and that there is no connection:
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/12956348
Other arguments against cancer link are that many users of mouthwash are smokers
The benefit studies are usually short term.
Here are studies claiming that there may be a risk:
http://www3.interscience.wiley.com/cgi-bin/fulltext/121540201/HTMLSTART?CRETRY=1&SRETRY=0
and that there is no connection:
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/12956348
Other arguments against cancer link are that many users of mouthwash are smokers