Georden Jones, Founder, The Peer Review · Last updated: September 6, 2026
A short, scannable roundup of what moved in the non-toxic world this past week: new regulations, ongoing litigation, and research worth knowing about, with a plain read on what it means if you’re shopping or living in Canada.
Regulatory & Legal
Health Canada recalled two imported kohl eyeliners for lead contamination. Mumtaz Herbal Kajal With Almond Oil for Sensitive Eyes and Al-Asmad Alharmain Zam Zam & Rose Water, both imported from India and the UAE by Mississauga-based Sara Islamic Store, were recalled on September 4 after testing found lead above the limits in Health Canada’s Guidance on Heavy Metal Impurities in Cosmetics [1]. Lead builds up in the body over time, and even small repeated doses can add up to levels linked to anemia, brain injury, and organ damage, which is why the limit exists in the first place. The company reported 576 units of each product sold in Canada between January and August 2026, with no injuries reported as of late August. Why it matters: lead-contaminated kohl is not a one-off. It shows up in Health Canada’s recall list repeatedly because traditional kohl is sometimes ground with lead-based compounds for pigment, a practice Western cosmetic regulation does not have to contend with in the same way. If you or your kids use kohl or kajal from outside the mainstream drugstore supply chain, this is worth reading alongside our heavy metals piece.
A cookware maker will pay out over calling its pans “non-toxic.” E. Mishan & Sons, the company behind Gotham Steel, Granite Stone, and Bell & Howell cookware, agreed to settle a class action alleging it falsely marketed its pans as “healthy,” “non-toxic,” and “safe” while they contained chromium, iron, nickel, lead, cadmium, PFOA, PFAS, PTFE, and PFOS [2]. The settlement covers buyers in California and Colorado between September 2021 and July 2026, pays $6 per product up to $12 per household, and requires the company to disclose the iron, chromium, and nickel content on future labels. The claims deadline is September 25, 2026, and the case still needs final court approval in November. Why it matters: Gotham Steel and Granite Stone are sold in Canada too, through the same retailers that carry them in the US, but this settlement only pays out to American buyers in two states. Canadians who own this cookware won’t see a cheque, but the chemical list disclosed in the case is the same regardless of where you bought the pan. Stainless steel and ceramic are the alternatives we’ve already tested if you’re looking to replace it.
Brand & Product Watch
Cookware giants are suing Caraway over its “toxic cookware” marketing. Groupe SEB USA (which owns T-fal) and Meyer Corp filed suit against Caraway Home in a New York federal court in February, arguing that Caraway’s ads calling competitors’ PTFE cookware “toxic” and capable of releasing “harmful fumes” are false advertising, pointing to a 2025 National Advertising Division ruling that found Caraway lacked a reasonable basis for those claims [3]. Caraway has moved to dismiss the case, and as of this week that motion is still pending in court. The dispute is unusual because the plaintiffs concede their cookware contains PTFE, then argue the amounts released are far below anything a consumer would encounter. Why it matters: Caraway sells in Canada, and its social media marketing, the same posts naming competitors’ pans as toxic, runs on the same feeds Canadian shoppers see. Whichever way the case goes, the ruling will set what Caraway and rivals like T-fal are each allowed to claim about PTFE safety in their marketing, and those claims land on Canadian shoppers the same way they land on American ones.
New Research
A new study found 87% of chemicals in food packaging have never been safety tested. Researchers at the Food Packaging Forum, publishing in Environmental Science & Technology, note that more than 15,000 chemicals can end up in food packaging and kitchenware, but most have no public safety data at all [4]. Rather than wait for testing that may never happen, the team grouped chemicals by structural similarity, on the logic that chemicals built the same way tend to behave the same way in the body, and identified 38 priority groups, including phthalates, PFAS, organophosphates, isocyanates, and aromatic amines, that together cover 4,222 chemicals currently on the market. Lead author Helene Wiesinger points out that many of these are marketed as replacements for chemicals already known to be hazardous, without evidence they’re any safer. Why it matters: this is the same regrettable-substitution pattern we’ve already covered with BPA being swapped for BPS, now shown to apply across thousands of packaging chemicals at once, not just one substitution at a time.
A Canadian study found sea spray isn’t the PFAS source researchers expected. York University researchers measured PFAS in coastal air along Newfoundland and Labrador, a location chosen specifically because its wind and wave conditions should produce the strongest sea-spray signal, and found the PFAS they detected showed little correlation with sodium, the tracer used to identify sea spray [5]. Instead, the evidence pointed to PFAS precursor compounds, more volatile PFAS relatives like fluorotelomer alcohols that off-gas from treated textiles and industrial sites, breaking down in the atmosphere into standard PFAS after traveling in from elsewhere, not ocean spray blowing onshore. Why it matters: this pushes back on earlier modeling that treated coastal air as a major PFAS exposure route, which is a reassuring narrowing for anyone living near the water. It doesn’t reduce PFAS exposure overall, since the same study still found PFAS at every site tested; it just points the source further away, back toward long-range airborne transport and industrial emissions, which is consistent with how PFAS turns up everywhere in Canada regardless of coastline.
Why This Matters to Canadians
The kohl recall is the only item this week enforced directly by Health Canada, and it’s a reminder that cosmetic lead limits get caught after the product is already on shelves, through a recall, rather than before import. Everything else happened in American courts or American labs but still reaches Canadians: the cookware brands named in the settlement and the lawsuit are sold here under the same names, so the chemical disclosures and marketing rulings coming out of US litigation describe the same pans in Canadian kitchens, even though no Canadian buyer is eligible for a payout. The two research items point in slightly different directions, one showing how little testing backs the packaging chemicals already in wide use, the other narrowing down where airborne PFAS comes from, and together they’re the kind of evidence that tends to show up in future regulation long before it shows up in a headline.
References
- “Traditional Kohl Products recalled due to chemical hazard.” Government of Canada Recalls and Safety Alerts.
- “Bell & Howell PFAS cookware class action settlement.” Top Class Actions.
- “PFAS Greenwashing: Company On Company Litigation Strikes.” The National Law Review, CMBG3 Law.
- Wiesinger, H., Parkinson, L. V., Geueke, B., Anguera Sempere, A., Boucher, J., Cabane, E., Scheringer, M., Muncke, M. (2026). “Prioritizing and Grouping Food Contact Chemicals – From chaos to clarity.” Environmental Science & Technology.
- “Exposure to forever chemicals through sea spray may be overblown.” News@York, York University.
Georden Jones is the founder of The Peer Review. Read the full story.