Warning: this post contains information about the wide-scale and ongoing damage to health and development caused by a certain class of chemicals found in every home, with children/babies/pregnant women particularly at risk. It does present a possible solution but if you would rather not know about the issue, then please do not read on.
In short, UK homes contain the highest-levels of flame retardant chemicals in the world with the result that UK mothers' breast milk also contains the highest levels of these chemicals in the world. Please do some research on flame retardants – e.g. check out the website of the Green Science Policy Institute: greensciencepolicy.org/topics/flame-retardants/. While this is a USA website, the same flame retardants and the same companies that produce them apply here too. It's just that there is less information about them in the UK for reasons discussed below.
In short, the pattern with flame retardants is that the chemical industry releases them on to the market, claiming they're safe. Much later, more independent testing finds they're toxic and they're banned. However, products containing banned flame retardants are still in millions of UK homes right this moment. These chemicals are just as damaging as asbestos, more so in some respects, yet there are no removable/recall systems in place for them – partly because industry does not want the expense of disposal and the current government is too weak to insist on it (even though the UK is signed up to an international convention that requires it).
The main reason UK homes contain such high levels of flame retardants is because we have the toughest flammability laws for domestic upholstered furniture in the world. This means the average home contains around 30-50 kgs of flame retardants in furniture alone. The problem is that the government department responsible for them, the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, discovered five years ago that they don't even work for the most part. BEIS came up with a solution but it has been blocked by the chemical and furniture industries, helped by corrupt or spineless civil servants in the department.
These regulations apply also to children's mattresses, Moses baskets, prams, buggies and so on. The EU does not have flame retardants in these products and California/the US has banned them too. Leaving the UK alone to insist on fire safety regulations that do not work but in the meantime are poisoning us and our children in our own homes. Flame retardants leach out of furniture very easily, which means your baby/child absorbs them into their blood around the clock.
I'm working with experts who are trying to raise the profile of this issue and force the government to change or get rid of these out of date regulations, and flame retardants along with them. It is not easy, mainly because industry makes huge profits from flame retardants (around £300m a year in UK furniture alone) and is resisting/shutting down the media and MPs from acting.
We are hoping that the Mumsnet will take up the cause and bring about enough pressure to force BEIS to act. Happy to answer any questions.