The Next Step in Detoxing: Uncovering Hidden Toxins

Inspired by my book of the Month, Getting Healthy in Toxic Times, By Dr Jenny Goodman.

The Big Picture

In my previous article, I discussed Dr Jenny Goodman's first book, Staying Alive in Toxic Times. We explored how modern innovation has raced ahead of our ability to fully understand its impact—on both our health and the environment. I shared some quick swaps to help undo some of the more immediate damage—small changes that can make a big difference.

Dr Jenny Goodman’s second book, Getting Healthy in Toxic Times, delves even deeper. It’s a fascinating, eye-opening read, peeling back the layers on why we continue to use products packed with harmful chemicals—many of which we don’t even realise we’re exposed to daily. She asks a question that very few doctors do: how can we protect ourselves from the pollution, chemicals, and toxins that pervade our environment?

Just like in my previous article, this is about awareness and providing you with solutions—small actions that can protect you, your family, and our planet too. But awareness comes with knowledge, which is often pretty hard to hear. If you want to skip to the swaps, just click here.

For more context, read on.

Epidemics, Not Outliers

As I write, I am sitting in the Colney Ward at the Norfolk and Norwich Hospital, with my fit and active mum, waiting for her chemotherapy treatment to begin. There are people from all walks of life here, each self-contained with looks of resignation or frowns of worry on their faces. Mum alone seems upbeat, cheeks rosy from the cold outside and eyes mischievous as she laughs with the receptionist about her illegal parking. It’s the same ward she came to just over ten years ago with my father when he was diagnosed with Blastoid mantle cell lymphoma. The symmetry is not lost on me, making her easy manner all the more remarkable.

What is becoming a horrifying reality is how many people I speak to who have a similar story to mine. It is estimated that half the population in the UK will get cancer in their lifetime. HALF! Diseases like cancer, autoimmune diseases, asthma, and brain diseases like Alzheimer’s and dementia are now epidemics. And it’s not just because we are an ageing population—that’s a myth. In fact, cancer rates are increasing fastest in children, and there is a rise in ‘early onset’ Alzheimer’s and dementia.

It’s really hard for us to notice that which has become ordinary. Ecologists call this the ‘shifting baseline syndrome,’ meaning that we can only compare the state of today’s wildlife—or human health—with what we remember from our past, which is limited to our own lifespan. I see myself within this framework. This journey has been like having a veil lifted from my eyes, helping me to move my baseline outside of personal recollections. My goal is to help people shift their own baseline—to a time before synthetic chemicals, before widespread pollution, before the madness of single-use products, when we were more in tune with our environment.

Asking The Right Questions

As I look around the ward, I see leaflets advising on how to manage cancer symptoms, support loved ones, and highlighting charities that raise funds for cures. While these charities do incredible work, I can’t help but wonder—where are the leaflets asking what on earth is going on? Why are so many young, fit, seemingly healthy people being afflicted by this terrible disease?

We need to ask what the root causes of these diseases are and how we can protect ourselves and our families. What are we doing now that we weren’t doing a hundred years ago? We must connect the dots between the environmental crisis and the health crisis. And understand that the things that are causing the environmental crisis are causing the health crisis too. We’re all too aware of the traffic pollution in the air, but are we also aware of the chemicals in our water, the toxins in the soil (and our food), the heavy metals hiding in some of household products we use everyday, what the synthetic chemicals in our cleaning products could be doing to us, and the impact of the electromagnetic energy emanating from our gadgets? If we can understand where all those toxins are, how they affect our health, then we can take positive steps to avoid them. We can safeguard ourselves with protective measures, minimise our interactions with those pollutants we can’t get away from, ensure our bodies have the right anti-toxin nutrients and take collective action to fight for our health and that of the environment. Ultimately, if we knew these steps might save our loved ones from these terrible diseases wouldn't we fight pretty hard to make them happen? As Dr Jenny Goodman puts it:

“When we finally realise that the decline in our loved ones' health is coming from the self-same causes as the forest fires on the other side of the globe, the same causes as the melting Arctic ice… the same causes as the missing dawn chorus... then perhaps we will see that this is all one fight: our right to a healthy life along with that of our fellow beings on this planet. Healing our bodies and repairing the earth are one and the same project.”

I was quite harsh on myself when I started this journey—wondering why I hadn't seen some of this for myself. Why it took for someone else to point it out to me. Why I was so slow to see what was right in front of my eyes—but this is the point - the reality is that it’s not in front of our eyes. It’s not transparent. Sometimes, it’s the result of a process that has developed over many years, allowing us to become desensitised to the changes (I touched on this in my blog The Hidden Cost of Convenience). Other times, it’s the work of active negligence or malpractice.

Fluoride In Our Waterways

Big corporations and governments aren’t prioritising our health or the planet’s well-being. They are driven by profit, cutting corners wherever possible. They go for the most cost-effective product, no matter what substances it contains, and we are the ones paying with our health. There are many examples of corporate or governmental negligence and malpractice, but one, in particular—discussed in detail in Getting Healthy in Toxic Times -makes the point clearly. I found it shocking because it highlights government and corporate collusion. It’s the story of how fluoride got into our waterways.

I always thought fluoride was essential for healthy teeth. It’s been drilled into us for years. Fluoride prevents tooth decay; that’s why it’s in our water and toothpaste. So, when I started seeing environmentally friendly toothpaste brands proudly advertising that they were fluoride-free, I was confused. Why would they move away from something so vital? After reading the book, I was more disturbed than confused!

The fluoride used in water isn’t the naturally occurring type but a toxic by-product of the fertiliser industry called hexafluorosilicic acid. In the 1950s, fertiliser manufacturers were banned from releasing toxic waste gases into the air or waterways—cattle and crops were dying downstream from where they were released! To solve this, they used ‘wet scrubbers’ to capture the gases, which were then mixed with water to produce hexafluorosilicic acid. This did prevent the gases from being released into the atmosphere, but the companies were then stuck with a hazardous waste product. What did they do? They packed it up in barrels and sold it to local authorities to put in their water supply. Somehow, during this process, it was reclassified as a ‘water treatment’—avoiding safety tests because it wasn’t classified as a drug.

This last bit is even more dodgy. Fluoride is not added to water in most of Europe because it is essentially mass medication without consent. Fluoride is the only chemical ever added to drinking water solely for medicinal purposes (to prevent tooth decay). Although areas where it has been removed have not seen a decrease in oral health. I’m no investigative journalist, but a quick Google search brings up study after study linking fluoride to neurological damage—especially in children. A 1995 study in the Journal of Neurotoxicology and Teratology found that fluoride accumulated in the brains of rats, causing behavioural deficits typical of neurotoxic agents. Other studies have linked fluoride to brittle bones, with evidence that it is responsible for increased hip fractures.

I’m sure many of you have watched Dark Waters, about the devastating effects of chemical waste from Teflon manufacturing, or Erin Brockovich, about the contamination of drinking water with hexavalent chromium. But to think something like this was happening in our backyard! The good news is that fluoride is only added to the water in certain areas of the UK. The bad news? The UK government is considering putting it into all water supplies.

With this example, you have to wonder what the government stands to gain from the agreement, other than a little backhander. We need to stop assuming that regulations are there to protect us—because if we do, we’re putting ourselves and our families at risk. It’s time to wake up and take back control of what we allow into our lives.

What's The Solution?

So, I did promise that I was not here to spread doom and gloom. Far from it. And that’s exactly why I love this book. Dr Jenny Goodman’s message aligns perfectly with what I advocate for through Eco Solutions. The solutions exist. The answers are out there. And—best of all—the power is in our hands. We, as consumers, have much more influence than we give ourselves credit for. We can demand better. We can break free from repetitive buying habits shaped by clever marketing and cheap, poor-quality products. We can stop waiting for corporations and governments to do the right thing and start recognising that change begins with us.

The key is awareness. The more you know, the more you can prevent. My husband thinks I’m mad for constantly researching this stuff—he’d rather block it all out and hope for the best. And honestly? I get it. Information overload is real, and it can cause apathy. But I'd rather know. My goal isn’t to terrify you—it’s to arm you with knowledge.

So, in the spirit of Eco Solutions and building on what was discussed in last month’s article, here are a few more nasties that are sneaking into your home and how to get rid of them:

Hidden Toxins at Home:

What They Are and How to Avoid Them

The Water From Your Tap

There are some nasties that have purposely been put into the water—for the greater good—like chlorine and fluoride (as we have discussed). And others are unwitting by-products of our day-to-day lives:

• Pesticides – Runoff from agricultural activities contaminates water sources.

• Pharmaceuticals and Hormones – Residues from medications (like antibiotics, antidepressants, and birth control hormones) enter water systems through human waste and improper disposal.

• Microplastics – These are forever because they don’t biodegrade. They break down into smaller and smaller particles until you have nano-plastics. And, as we learned last month, these sit on your oestrogen receptors and act as oestrogen mimics.

• Chlorine – It kills harmful bacteria but doesn’t deal with any of the other nasties and isn’t great for us to consume either.

What's the Solution?

I recommend a high-quality water filter and, if possible, one that can be applied to your house system rather than just one that sits on the counter. I know it seems incredibly unfair that we have to pay big corporations to do a poor job of cleaning our water and then pay again to clean the water properly at home. There are a number of great campaigns fighting this cause that you can align yourself with to demand change; Surfers Against Sewage and River Action UK to name a couple.

Regarding the type of water filtration to go for—I know I usually make a recommendation, but it's tricky with filtration systems as everyone's needs are different (if you're renting, you’ll be looking for a countertop system rather than an installed one). The most effective ones are either reverse osmosis or UV filtration systems. UV (sunlight) is the best and the safest.

Deodorants

This one really p***ed me off. It's so negligent. Most deodorants contain aluminium in the form of salts that dissolve in sweat to form a gel plug in sweat glands. The problem is that the aluminium can be absorbed straight through the skin of the armpit and builds up in breast tissue. It has been strongly linked with breast cancer and is not something we want being absorbed so close to the brain, as it has also been implicated in Alzheimer's disease. Dr Goodman has a very compelling case study on the effects of aluminium on the brain in her book. Spray deodorants are the worst because you are actually inhaling the aluminium.

What's The Solution?

There are natural, highly effective alternatives—check out my latest blog on bathroom swaps.

Cookware

Nickel (stainless steel), aluminium, and chromium can be found in pots and pans. The major issue with these materials is that when cooking anything acidic (like tomato sauce), the heavy metals leach out of the pan and into your food. These chemicals are carcinogenic and endocrine disruptors (meaning they can interfere with the body’s hormones).

The pans known to be the real hazard are non-stick pans. What makes them non-stick is Teflon or something similar (think Dark Waters). It’s nasty and causes a whole host of long-term damage.

What's The Solution?

I don't usually advocate chucking something away if it’s still working, but if you have non-stick pans, I recommend they go straight in the bin. With stainless steel, just avoid cooking acidic foods in them. Boiling pasta is probably fine. If you're buying new pans, the best options are ceramic or cast iron.

Cleaning Products

We touched on this one last month. It’s pretty impossible to fully comprehend the ingredients lists on these products unless you have a chemistry degree, but most of them are classified as hazardous and as biocides—putting them in the same category as pesticides - meaning they damage living organisms. Using them regularly in our homes exposes us to thousands of low-dose chemicals that accumulate to chronic exposure.

What's The Solution?

There are lots of amazing brands rethinking this—I’ve outlined My Top 3 Eco Swaps For Your Kitchen.

Wi-Fi / 5G / EMR

This is really a teaser for the book. There is simply no way I can go into all the extensive research Dr Goodman has done around this or the science that backs it up. The evidence shows that the electromagnetic radiation (EMR) emitted by anything that works on Wi-Fi damages our cells. This is more prevalent in children who—still developing—are more susceptible to cell disruption. EMR waves are also strongly linked to infertility in men.

What's the Solution?

Keep all Wi-Fi hubs and equipment out of your bedroom. If you must sleep with your phone in your room, put it on airplane mode. Don’t work with your laptop on your lap, try not to keep your phone in your pocket, and use headphones rather than holding it to your ear. Take note of how many Wi-Fi systems you have at home and make sure to turn off any that you aren’t using all the time.

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Final Thoughts

When I first started this journey, I thought that living sustainably was about reducing waste, cutting down on plastic, and choosing products that were better for the planet. While that’s still a big part of it, I’ve come to realise that living sustainably is also about protecting our health. It’s about avoiding the toxins that harm us and our environment. It’s about questioning the status quo and being open to seeing things differently.

Dr Jenny Goodman’s books have been a big part of this journey for me. They’ve helped me connect the dots between the environmental crisis and the health crisis. They’ve shown me that healing our bodies and repairing the earth are one and the same project.

This book, and the research behind it, reinforces something I now believe so strongly: our choices matter. Every purchase, habit, and small swap contributes to a larger, much-needed shift in how we care for ourselves and our planet. The more we educate ourselves, the more control we have over our health and well-being. And that, to me, is empowering.

So, let’s continue this journey together. Small steps, big impact—because swaps, not sacrifices, are the key to lasting change.