h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

I have been intrigued to see how popular disinfectant home cleaning tissues have become - my own daughters, who have babies, regularly use them. They don't wear gloves, nor do they take any precautions.
As these tissues contain no bleach and kill 99.99 per cent of germs - what is the active constituent? The list of ingredients only states 'Contains disinfectant'. As a consequence, I called a help line - at first they were reluctant to tell me the active constituent, finally they told me that it was Benzalkonium Chloride.
What's that you may ask? Well, according to net searches, this is a toxic detergent. It has mutating properties and does not sound at all friendly!
My question to the Community is 'Who regulates the UK Industry that produces these cleaning products?' and the obvious follow on, is this chemical safe to us and the environment?

Sorry, I don't know the reply to your question (not a UK resident) but I'd advise strongly not to use any disinfectant products at all, since these help bacteria develop a resistancy against antibiotics, among other things.

It might kill the bacteria to begin with, but bacteria are very good at adapting themselves to changed environmental hazards...

Besides, children that grow up in a perfectly clean and sterile environment tend to develop allergies more easily than other children, since their immunity systems have never been challenged.

See, that's what most allergies are basically about - your immunity system over-reacting against perfectly harmless things, since the system lacks experience to determine what's harmful and what's not.

And what child ever died from being exposed to a bit of dirt and dust?

I would tend to agree. Good old soap & water & teaching kids (& parents and medical staff!) to wash their hands & keep food surfaces clean by the same means is far more important i think.

I read somewhere that anti-bacterial agent stuff is effective for around 30 seconds, during which time the next person could have been to the loo & not washed their hands afterward.

Marketing ploy in my opinion!

Kids develop immunity by being exposed to "normal" bugs; ie: doing as kids do; grubbing around in muck outside then being scrubbed down by parents after, before they sit down to eat.

zdt