Voters agree on need for more protections from chemicals

U.S. voters overwhelmingly say they want the government and industry to ensure the products they buy are free of harmful chemicals, and that they are willing to pay more for them, according to a national online survey commissioned by the Program on Reproductive Health and the Environment (PRHE) at the University of California, San Francisco (UCSF).

“At a time when most issues are politically polarized, the issue of protecting people from harmful chemicals is finding broad agreement among Democrats, Republicans and independent voters,” said Celinda Lake, president of Lake Research Partners, who led the poll.

The survey of 1,200 registered voters found broad agreement that the government requires products to be proven safe before being marketed. More than 90% of those surveyed support this requirement and two thirds fully agree with these ideas.

The poll also found:

92% of voters agree and 63% of voters fully agree that the government should require products to be proven safe before companies are allowed to market them.
93% of voters agree and 62% fully agree that companies should do better to remove harmful chemicals from consumer products.
88% agree that companies should do more to remove plastic and plastic packaging from consumer products.
76% are concerned about the impact chemicals and plastics have on climate change.
54% say the chemical regulations are not strong enough, while 21% say they are about right and 10% say they are too strict.
89% support (56% strongly support) the goal of the Toxic Substances Control Act to make it easier to restrict or ban harmful chemicals and to better protect vulnerable populations such as pregnant women, children and people living near polluting factories to protect.
93% agree (57%). from everyday products, even if this increases the cost for some products.

Voters are concerned about all the chemicals they were asked about in the survey, and most expressed concern about chemicals ingested through water, food and food packaging. Yet they don’t know how the chemical control system works. About half (49%) say the chemicals in food and consumer products have been tested for safety, although this is not true.

“People assume that what they buy is safe and that’s almost always not the case,” said Tracey J. Woodruff, Ph.D., a professor of obstetrics, gynecology, and reproductive sciences, who directs PRHE and the EaRTH Center at UCSF. “The good news is that this research shows overwhelming support for the government to better protect people from harmful chemicals.”

The poll was conducted from May 25 to June 5, 2022.

More information:
Research methodology: Lake Research Partners designed and administered this online dial survey, which was conducted from May 25 to June 5, 2022. The survey reached a total of 1,200 registered voters across the country, including 800 base voters and cross-samples of 100 black registered voters, 100 Latinx registered voters voters, 100 Asian voters American Pacific Islander registered voters and 100 Gen-Z registered voters. Oversamples were designed to ensure that the results were representative of the US voting population.