Special to eTC

 

Posted March 31, 2020

 

By Jeffery B. Keane

 

As the CEO of an advanced materials company that provides its technology in many textile platforms, I have been watching foreign textile technology companies profiteering in the USA with their anti-COVID-19 claims while USA-based companies play clean by following strict U.S. EPA/FIFRA/FTC/FDA guidelines in marketing and advertising. As I see these claims escalate, I can’t sit quietly anymore.

 

Though these are foreign companies, they still MUST follow U.S. guidelines when communicating to a U.S. audience. They’re not. Why does it matter? Because the consumer goods companies they’re selling to do not know they will not be able to make the same claims to the end customer that made them buy into the technology and if they do make these claims, they and the retailer will be liable for making unsubstantiated public health claims.

 

If you’re working in textiles you probably remember a couple years ago when the FTC sued major retailers for simply advertising “rayon” as “bamboo”, ordering them to pay civil damages. That’s nothing compared to marketing and advertising about efficacy against COVID-19 using the same language that these companies are touting to sell their textile technologies. Companies, retailers and ad agencies in this space aren’t used to their marketing being regulated by the EPA and in some cases FDA. Retail and apparel sectors are in enough trouble right now, they don’t need the FTC coming down on them for going to market with products they label effective against viruses.

 

The textile technology companies making these egregious claims have been primarily operating in the consumer space for freshness or other secondary attributes. They don’t do business in serious infection prevention or wound care segments, but now they’re making outrageous COVID-19 claims far beyond what the EPA/FTC/FDA allows, making health claims they don’t have clinical level evidence to support. As a supplier of mission-critical textile-based antimicrobial components for the healthcare and military sector, we can’t and won’t risk making outrageous and unlawful claims. These foreign entities don’t have much to lose and everything to gain in the panic of this epidemic.

 

If, as a textile manufacturer, apparel company or retailer, you are about to put a textile technology into your consumer product that has been sold to you on the basis of efficacy against viruses in general or COVID-19 specifically, please know you will not be able to pass on those claims to your customers. EPA/FDA and FTC tightly regulate advertising in this category. These textile technology products are not EPA-registered in a class that can make the “Public Health” claims they are making. Your marketing department’s hands will be tied.

 

Here are the basics of why you will not be able to advertise “anti-viral” on textiles:

 

• Virus in regulatory terms is a “Pathogen,” meaning it’s related to public health. In the USA, to claim you can inhibit or kill a pathogen is making a public health claim and therefore requires specific direct evidence of efficacy.

• To make a public health claim for non-medical device products, it needs to be demonstrated to EPA as efficacious using an approved protocol mimicking real life / worst case conditions.  ​

• Currently there are no EPA approved public health claims for virus & textiles.

 

For all guidelines, please visit the EPA site on guidelines for marketing.

 

We know the EPA is looking into these companies, but this will take time. We want manufactures and brands to understand that these anti-viral claims made by textile technology companies may not be based on clinical level evidence that meets EPA and FDA standards. Even if they were, they are not allowed to make these claims in the U.S. without EPA and FDA specific approval. Most important, consumer brands and retailers need to understand they can’t pass on these claims to the end user.

 

Jeffery B. Keane is CEO of Noble Biomaterials, a Scranton, Pa.-based global leader in antimicrobial and conductivity solutions for soft surface applications.