Possible “nappy tax” on disposables

I got the eco-friendly disposable nappies for my daughter, she was excited to use them but they all either fell apart or leaked.

icanhandthemback

My daughter uses washable nappies with her 2 year old and has for the last 18 months. They are vastly different from the Terry nappies we used with my children.

grandtanteJE65 can you point to the research that says that not changing nappies leads to the chronic inflammation of the bladder later on? I'm not sure how that computes as we now know that a stretchy bladder which doesn't empty as often as it should because we don't get the signals is problematic and leads to chronic inflammation. Anybody who has lax joints (used to be known as double jointed) is more likely to suffer that could be prone to that. They also wouldn't need their nappy changed as often as it wouldn't be wet but then it would flood as the bladder released its very full contents. Those little girls (and boys) would possibly suffer regular UTI's because of the bacteria which would inflame the bladder. Changing the nappies more frequently would do nothing to help nappy rash or stop bladder problems.

No, sorry, I haven't been able to find the source for the problems being related to children being left in wet nappies too long, but it was being researched in Danish hospitals some years ago.

I can assure you that any child I have ever looked after who had a nappy rash suffered far less when never left in a wet nappy and washed in cool water every time his or he nappy was changed. Giving the children more cold water to drink too, thus increasing the flow of urine but decreasing its strenght helped against nappy rash as well.

Isn't the answer some invention that deals with all sanitary products. It would have to be a chemical, I suppose, to break down all those 'drying' ingredients in sanitary towels/ nappies/incontinent pads. If only these dirty articles could be broken down into, for example, a product for use in industry, it would be great.

i used to hang out washed nappies in the back garden but not everyone has a garden. When there was an overnight frost the nappies became lovely and soft.
Never found out why?

I had a spin dryer, couldn't afford a washing machine. I changed the bucket every day and it didn't smell.

Not sure about the issue of scraping poo off a nappy liner, you are supposed to do that with disposables aren't you? It used to be on the packets when DIL left a packet for me when I was looking after GC.

Disposables piling up in landfill is bad enough but loads of poo as well is pretty disgusting.

Sometimes the old ways are not better! I can’t imagine anything worse than hand washing terry nappies even after being soaked in napisan. How on earth do you get them dry enough to be hung up on an airier without a wringer or spin dryer? You must have had dripping nappies all over the place for days!

I used terry nappies in the 1980s and can still remember the acrid stink from the nappy bucket sat next to the toilet, even using napisan could not mask it. And having to scrape off the poo from the liner or nappy into the toilet before soaking it!

When I went back to work, the nursery my 6 month old son went to would only use disposable nappies and sold them to mums in bulk. I still used terry nappies at night and weekends but found loads of excuses to use the disposable ones if I could. Even with a washing machine, the extra washing while working full time was a nightmare. When my next child was born, my husband bought a tumble drier as a gift for me - much appreciated.

The answer to the problem of getting rid of disposable nappies is to invest money in making them biodegradable so that they don’t go to landfill. The powers that be also need to look at incontinence products which are also a huge problem in landfill.

It may well do.

M0nica

To be fair it is sometime since I used a launderette and I cannot remember how much it cost, but buying a domestic washing machine costs money, even a second hand one, and running it also costs money.

It is like having a car and using taxis. Taxis are expensive, as is running a car, but if you are not running a car, the cost of that will pay for a lot of taxis.

But you seem to miss my main point that is poverty is a problem on its own standing and should be treated separately from the problem of the harm done to the environment by disposable nappies.

Are we to do catastrophic damage to the environment by poisoning the land by burying billions of nappies every year or add increasing CO emissions to the air around us helping the rapid rise in Global warming by incinerating them because some people are poor? isn't better to look to the solutions to both problems and not make one hold back the second.

I still think the old bucket and napisan works well with no washing machine needed.

To be fair it is sometime since I used a launderette and I cannot remember how much it cost, but buying a domestic washing machine costs money, even a second hand one, and running it also costs money.

It is like having a car and using taxis. Taxis are expensive, as is running a car, but if you are not running a car, the cost of that will pay for a lot of taxis.

But you seem to miss my main point that is poverty is a problem on its own standing and should be treated separately from the problem of the harm done to the environment by disposable nappies.

Are we to do catastrophic damage to the environment by poisoning the land by burying billions of nappies every year or add increasing CO emissions to the air around us helping the rapid rise in Global warming by incinerating them because some people are poor? isn't better to look to the solutions to both problems and not make one hold back the second.

I'm not sure why washing machines and tumble dryers are such an issue, I used to do my nappies with a bucket and some napisan. An airer draped with nappies used to be quite normal in winter. I also worked fulltime.

M0nica

Theworriedwell I suggested that two or three familes could get together to share one big load in the biggest machine. This was not a launderette. Just a battery of great big stainless steel machines standing outside in the car park - and they spin nearly dry so no tumble drying is required, so ideal for people in cramped housing with no drying space.

We are conflating two different problems, first that billions, yes, billions of nappies are being consigned to land fill when landfill is in short supply and they continue to pollute thee soil and run-off for 100s of years - and then there is a problem of poverty. Are we to continue to pollute the atmosphere, accelerate Global Warming and ruin everybodies life just because some people are poor?

Surely we should address the problem of poverty quite separately. If everything and all progress were to be held back because some members of society were poor, and that has included members of my own family in the past, then we would still be living in thatched wooden huts and scratching small subsistence fields with hoes.

You also said, "I have seen a few of these in the UK and here are still lauderettes around. I used one to locally to wash a duvet."

Don't you think the launderette is expensive?

If this becomes law then I would expect manufacturers to follow suit with biodegradable disposable nappies - there may already be some available, no kids here so I don't know personally.

Theworriedwell I suggested that two or three familes could get together to share one big load in the biggest machine. This was not a launderette. Just a battery of great big stainless steel machines standing outside in the car park - and they spin nearly dry so no tumble drying is required, so ideal for people in cramped housing with no drying space.

We are conflating two different problems, first that billions, yes, billions of nappies are being consigned to land fill when landfill is in short supply and they continue to pollute thee soil and run-off for 100s of years - and then there is a problem of poverty. Are we to continue to pollute the atmosphere, accelerate Global Warming and ruin everybodies life just because some people are poor?

Surely we should address the problem of poverty quite separately. If everything and all progress were to be held back because some members of society were poor, and that has included members of my own family in the past, then we would still be living in thatched wooden huts and scratching small subsistence fields with hoes.

My grandson was in modern cloth nappies. They proved to be no more tricky than disposable ones. He never once suffered from nappy rash. His mother was working full time and once she got her head around a routine didn't find these nappies onerous. His nursery was happy to use them too. In fact they used to look forward to seeing which bright and jazzy outer cover he was wearing. To be honest, it's a choice and choices have consequences, whether they affect us directly or indirectly.

As a grandma looking after two twelve month olds for two days a week to help out my daughters working to pay their mortgages I would gladly pay more tax on disposable nappies for the sake of my sanity ! Also I do not see how having my washing machine and dryer going for hours would help save the planet, better to use the extra tax raised for development of more eco friendly disposables.

My three had cloth nappies. Modern day ones are beautifully shaped and easy to use. Much easier than the squares I had to fold into a kite shape to put on my babies. With washing machines and tumble driers hardly a problem to use.

M0nica

We have just used a washing machine, one of a set of three outside a supermarket in France. It took 47 minutes (precisely) and because they were industrial washers they spun the washing nearly dry, just needed a bit of airing. We used the 18 kilo load machine( there was also an 8 kilo machine) as we had the bedding from 6 beds plus towels, but a couple of families could share a load.

I know it is a cliche to say see life in solutions not problems, but when anybody introduces any idea that would ameliorate any of the problems facing the work, you can virtually guarantee that someone will pour ice cold water on the suggestion 'because it will affect the poorest in society'.

I am with most people in seeing poverty as a problem that has to be eliminated, but, I wish those saying it would think round and suggest possible solutions. Landfill rubbish is a major problem in almost any country, nappies form a significant part of landfill and do not rot for hundreds of years. A solution needs to be found whether people are poor or rich.

I have seen a few of these in the UK and here are still lauderettes around. I used one to locally to wash a duvet.

I've used launderettes on holiday and found them very expensive. I would think using them week in week out would be more than alot of families could afford.

In the 70s when I had my two, I started with Terry's and when we moved to Sweden just after my DD was born, it was impossible to get, Napisan, waterproof pants, nappy pins etc because it was all disposables. Magic. What a relief.

Yes the question of long term degradation of disposables, but in the big picture there are many, many other areas where long term deterioration is far more dangerous for the planet.

So given the life style of young mums these days, give them a break, a few months of using these nappies is forgiveable.

The only drawback is the durability of them, and as mentioned earlier, this delays the child becoming dry early. Just get on with potty training earlier, take off nappies in summer etc. My daughter was 11 months when she was dry and this with using disposables.

Riverwalk Between 50 and 20,000 years depending on your source.

Friends of the Earth Scotland said 500, but gave no source for their figures.

A government report says ^Regarding landfill and energy from waste, the recent peer-reviewed software tool,
WRATE, was used to model waste management activities. The research and documentation associated with WRATE suggests gas generation is complete within 100 years, and leachate release to groundwater approaches levels of contaminant detection within 20,000 years. WRATE attributes these total emissions of gas and leachate to the material as soon as it is landfilled.^ assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/291130/scho0808boir-e-e.pdf

According to The Guardian, biodegradable disposable nappies take 50 years to decompose www.theguardian.com/environment/blog/2010/apr/26/nappy-debate

Well you did ask!

Riverwalk I love you.

No one has answered my request for evidence that disposables take hundreds of years to decompose ... fair enough.

I was just randomly thinking how eco-damaging are golf courses - all that water to keep the greens looking nice. And taking up space that could be used for much-needed houses.

Going back to toilet training - my youngest was born in Singapore where we had all tiled floors. So I bought a lot of little knickers and she just ran around and peed etc on impulse. She soon learned that it was better to stop and control rather than feel all soggy and uncomfortable.
She would be just over a year old.

For many years after they were no longer needed as nappies, I used them as cleaning cloths.

My daughter uses reusable nappies. They are a far cry from Terry nappies. They are all different and brightly coloured and dry really easily. However they are very expensive to buy and not all parents could afford the initial outlay although they will break even or save money over time.