"Baby's tub is still toxic" is about as far away as you can get from being a nursery rhyme or playground chant. It signifies, rather, the continuing concerns of various health advocacy groups regarding a Johnson & Johnson (J&J) product that contains both known and likely cancer-causing carcinogens.

Johnson & Johnson's baby shampoo is, say critics, a flatly unsafe product, and continues to be so even years after an independent laboratory found that it contained two problem ingredients:1,4-dioxane and quaternium-15.

It still contains those chemicals, even after two-plus years of strong calls for their removal. The former is considered a likely carcinogen; the latter is a preservative that releases formaldehyde to kill bacteria. The U.S. National Toxicology Program has declared formaldehyde a known human carcinogen.

The Campaign for Safe Cosmetics -- as well as groups that include the Breast Cancer Fund, Friends of the Earth, American Nurses Association and other bodies -- have been consistently calling on J&J to remove the products and have now stepped up their efforts by urging a boycott and increasing public pressure on the company.

In fact, J&J does offer a second baby shampoo, called Naturals, that is chemical-free, but that product costs nearly twice as much as its original formula, which J&J has been unwilling to shelve. Johnson & Johnson maintains that the preservatives are safe and approved.

That hasn't mollified critics.

"Even though the chemicals may be low-level, why risk it?" counters one reproductive and environmental health expert.

It remains to be seen how effective a boycott effort will be, and to what extent J&J will comply with the demands of the broad coalition of critics now confronting it.

Source: Bloomberg, "Groups push J&J on baby shampoo chemicals" Nov. 1, 2011