He said he'd find out. A few days later he stuck a blurry fax in my door. Even with a partial formula, that's two strikes down. That 4,5 dichloro business means the active ingredient is an organic chemical containing chlorine. Not all organochlorines are harmful, but they all cause a problem when they are incinerated, which is, unfortunately, what ultimately happens to my vacuum cleaner bags.
Japan is the incinerator hub of the world.
Dioxin is a single name for a set of chemicals that are formed when organochlorines are burned. The World Health Organization has just declared dioxin to be a carcinogen. It is also an endocrine disrupter, altering hormone balances and disrupting the development of the fetuses of many kinds of animals, including humans. The Japanese are in a tizzy about their dioxin-laced air. The government has just ordered a shut-down of thousands of industrial incinerators and is planning to rebuild its municipal ones so they burn hotter and produce, it is hoped, less dioxin.