Could this common antibacterial cause antibiotic resistance?

Press Release, GreenFacts asbl

Triclosan & Antibiotic Resistance

Recent scientific information examined by EU scientific committee

Brussels, 22 November 2011.

Triclosan is a commonly used antibacterial product. Although it is widely used, in cosmetics and cleaning products for instance, very little is known about the amount of it that ends up in the environment and about its effect on bacteria in those conditions. One possibility is that bacteria might become resistant to it after being exposed to small amounts in the environment, and that this resistance might help bacteria resist antibiotics. Does the use of Triclosan really pose such a risk?

Does SCCS consider a continued use of triclosan as a preservative in cosmetic products as safe taking into account the new provided documentation of resistance development by certain micro-organisms and cross-resistance?

This question is answered by the Scientific Committee on Consumer Safety (SCCS) of the European Commission which examined newly available scientific information and issued an “Opinion on triclosan (antimicrobial resistance)”.

At the request of the European Commission DG Health and Consumer Protection, GreenFacts faithfully summarised this recent scientific opinion. The plain-language summary is now available from the EU Directorate General of Health and Consumers in four languages: English, French, Spanish and German. It is also available from the GreenFacts website as questions and answers in 3 levels of increasing detail or as a 1-page printable citizens' summary.

Highlights of the SCCS Opinion

What exactly is Triclosan?
Triclosan is an antibacterial agent found in many cleaning products and in everyday items like cosmetics as a preservative.
It is widely used in hospitals and clinics as a disinfectant, for instance in the products used by surgeons to wash their hands, or in cleaning operating rooms.

Why could there a risk of developing antibiotic resistance?
Bacteria can use many different strategies to survive biocides. Some of those strategies are specific to a specific compound of to a narrow family of compounds, but some are more general, and can be used by the bacteria to survive attacks by many different compounds/agents/molecules/chemicals. In the latter case, if a bacteria becomes resistant to Triclosan, the resistance strategy could potentially give them a resistance to antibiotics as well.
Also, bacteria have the capacity to pass genetic information from one to the other, even to bacteria of other species, which means that in theory an non-infectious bacteria could develop a resistance and pass it down to another bacteria that causes infections, making harder to treat if it acquires a resistance to antibiotics.

Is there any evidence that Triclosan could cause this?
So far, after 40 years of intensive use of Triclosan, there have been no evidence of a resistance developing either in homes and hospital or in the environment, where Triclosan is released with waste water. In a laboratory setting it has been shown that it is possible, however, and more research is needed to rule out or confirm the possibility for bacteria to develop resistance to Triclosan, and the possibility of developing a accompanying resistance to antobiotics.
The EC Scientific Committee on Consumer Safety (SCCS) concludes that to date there is no evidence that using Triclosan leads to an increase in antibiotic resistance. It also strongly recommends that more research is conducted in order to better understand the issue.

About GreenFacts

The GreenFacts initiative was initiated in 2001 by individuals from scientific institutions, environmental and health organizations, and businesses, who called for wider access to unbiased information on health and the environment.

The objective is to bring complex scientific reports on health and the environment to the reach of non-experts. The GreenFacts website which publishes faithful summaries of authoritative international scientific reports is currently managed by Cogeneris sprl. The summaries are written in a language for non-specialists and presented in a reader-friendly Three-Level Structure of increasing detail. GreenFacts’ publications are freely available in several languages on www.greenfacts.org.

About the Scientific Committee on Consumer Safety (SCCS)

The SCCS (Scientific Committee on Consumer Safety) is one of three independent non-food scientific committees set up to advise the European Commission on matters of consumer safety, public health and the environment.

The SCCS provides opinions on questions concerning all types of health and safety risks (notably chemical, biological, mechanical and other physical risks) of non-food consumer products (for example: cosmetic products and their ingredients, toys, textiles, clothing, personal care and household products such as detergents, etc.) and services (for example: tattooing, artificial sun tanning, etc.).

About DG Health and Consumers

The role of Health and Consumers Directorate General of the European Commission is to make Europe’s citizens healthier, safer and more confident. Over the years the European Union has established EU laws on the safety of food and other products, on consumers' rights and on the protection of people's health. The DG Health and Consumers has the task of keeping these laws up to date. It also ensures that the national, regional or even local governments in EU countries apply the EU's health and consumer protection laws and make sure traders, manufacturers and food producers in their country observe the rules.

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