Hobby Products

Evaluating the Hazard Posed by Specific Substances

The hazard posed by any material depends in part on how it is used, including frequency of use and length of exposure. For instance, a paint thinner used for 15 minutes on a single [Page 209]day to strip a piece of furniture may pose minimal risk, but the same substance might be hazardous if used by an individual for eight hours per day, every day. An additional risk applies to people who use hazardous materials in their home (typical of most hobbyists and artists with a home studio): if the material lingers in the air due to inadequate ventilation, the length of exposure may be much greater than just the time the material was in active use.

There are three main ways toxic substances can enter the body: skin contact, inhalation, and ingestion. The latter may result from causes such as painters pointing their paintbrush with their lips or by the user failing to wash up after working with toxic substances and before eating. Children and adolescents have higher risk of harm from exposure to toxic substances because they are smaller and have faster metabolisms than adults, and fetuses are highly sensitive to many chemicals, even if the exposure is secondhand: for instance, studies have shown that women whose husbands work in the chemical industry have an elevated rate of miscarriages.

Two additional factors must be considered in evaluating the hazard posed by any substance. The first is whether it accumulates in the body over time so that even small exposures over a period of time can lead to a high total body burden (the total amount of the substance present in the body). This is a characteristic of some metals, including lead, mercury, cadmium, manganese, and arsenic, as well as some organic chemicals such as chlorinated hydrocarbons.

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