Caution: Laser Printer Could Harm Your Health

by David Risley on Sep 14, 2007 | 18 comments

A lot of computer users today (including myself) have a laser printer. Laser printers offer good quality and are very fast printers. So, it is a good technology. That said, might it be that it is a technology that has side effects on our health?

Some Say Yes

There was a report put out a month or so ago from an Australian air quality researcher claiming exactly that. They contend that laser printers spew out large amounts of particulate matter into the air which can be harmful when breathed in. The study was published by Environmental Science and Technology, a publication by the American Chemical Society. They specifically tested 62 different laser printer models and found that 17 of them were particularly high emitters of toner into the air.

According to a PC World article about this study:

Two printers released medium levels of particulates, six issued low levels, and 37 — or about 60 percent of those tested — released no particles at all. HP, which is one of the world’s leading printer sellers, dominated both the list of high-level emitting and non-emitting printers.

HP responded to an inquiry by PC World by saying they were looking into it. Then, a few days later, HP responded again challenging the findings. According to the STLtoday.com story:

“Vigorous tests are an integral part of HP’s research and development and its strict quality-control procedures,” the statement said, in part. “HP LaserJet printing systems, original HP print cartridges and papers are tested for dust release and possible material emissions and are compliant with all applicable international health and safety requirements.
“Based on our own testing … we do not believe there is a link between printer emissions and any public health risk,” HP said.
The company says it intends to speak with the report’s authors in greater detail about their research.

So, what’s the truth?

Practice Common Sense

Obviously, HP has a business interest in saying their products are safe. That said, keep in mind that the media LOVES to make huge generalities out of a single study somebody did. People can make study come out pretty much any way want, and the media’s only criteria for making it front-page news is whether it is sensational and controversial. So, it is really easy to jump to conclusions if you don’t have your BS filter enabled.

That said, just because you can’t see it doesn’t mean it isn’t there. For instance, sitting in front of a computer monitor for a long time is said to be able to cause problems due to radiation. Many people out there put filters over their computer screens specifically to filter out this bad radiation. It is easy to say it is crap because you can’t see it. Hocus pocus some would say. But, that is potentially VERY close minded and ignorant.

I would recommend practicing common sense. Do you want to throw out your laser printer? Of course not. Do you want to do what you can to keep the room it is in ventilated? Absolutely.

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http://www.pulltheplug.co.uk/ weee
I think you’re absolutely right suggesting people make sure their room is well ventilated. We’ve noticed some older laser printers seem to give off more odour which might be a sign they’re releasing more toner.
sagl
The study does not say whether the particles are bad for you, just that they are there. We inhale various things all day long without problems.
AN
If you don’t consider lung cancer a “problem”, that is.
Rod
I think we are doing too much witch hunting in this country.One day something is bad for you and 6 mos later it is good for you. I haven’t heard of any IT professionals dying from “toner lung”. I am sure if you snorted the toner into your lungs like cocaine you would die. I am still going to eat burgers and fries, smoke an occasional cigar and print from my HP laserjet 2100. Oh yeah and have an occasional beer. I’ll ride my Harley w/o a helmet, drive my car w/o a seat belt, my kids ride their bike without helmets and pads, just like we did when we were kids. Somewhere our founding fathers are not believing what we are letting go on in this country. And neither can I. Where has our freedom gone?
David Risley
Rod, I don’t see what it has to do with freedom. Just because one says that there might be a health risk to laser printers doesn’t mean anybody is going to come and take your laser printer away from you. I think you’re making a connection that doesn’t exist.
Rod
It does when you are an arthritis sufferer and the only meds that help you are now off the mkt because some study said they might cause heart attacks but only a few people have actually had them. I was on them for three years and never so much as had chest pain and now I am hurting every day. I am sick of turning on the TV and seeing these lawyers.Heck Marijuana should be legal. In Canada there is a study on using Cannibis for Arthritis and fibromyalgia but do you think we will ever see it in this country. Nope! Now don’t get me wrong its been proven that cigarettes cause cancer in some people. I agree that that is true. But I can show you several people that I know that have smoked for 50 + years and don’t have it. I am just sick of the government trying to take away things.I am sure that some of these printers might put off some toner in the air. And I am sure that Guns don’t kill people people do. Yeah hamburgers and french fries are gonna make you fat and might give you colon cancer. But I don’t want someone telling me that I can’t have them. All i was attempting to say is that this is how it starts. Give us the info but let us make the decision to use it or not. But just forget I said anything.
breathin’ freely
An online veterinary pharmacist suggests we take Prednisone 5mg tablets…bit of overkill, don’t you think? As an asthmatic, I recommend Advair Diskus 100/50 as a more reasonable start.
There are a huge number of variables here: toner cartridge vs. refillable receptacle, age of printer, toner particle size, distance one sits away from printer, duration(hours, days, weeks, months, years one has sat next to a printer)…
Now, maybe if somebody got some of those rocket scientists who thought up all of those crazy schemes investing in sub-prime mortgages and turned them loose on this subject, quite a few IT workers, printer repair workers, toner cartridge remanufacturers, et al. would be able to retire if some all-star lawyers like Johnnie Cochran or Alan Dershowitz ran the trial…
(HHOK)
Mary
Rod,
You state notable considerations and each onto themselves is not a problem. The human body is pretty resourceful. However, we’ve surrounded ourselves so much with chemicals in our environment that our body’s ability to balance itself does get overwhelmed. That is when we get fibromyalgia, arthritis, cancers, headaches; the resiliency can’t go on forever. So, then you depend on more chemicals to correct the problem. I’ve been a RN for 30′s years – definitely see the ramifications. Moderation in everything, then our bodies can fend for themselves. However, in tight environments with poor ventilation and lots of chemicals there is certainly concern. I doubt that the laser printer on my desk will be moved – I am very thankful that we have a vent in our office, my officemate continually runs a fan, and I spend a fair amount of time in other places in the hospital. Moderation in everything.
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Robert
As a field service/customer engineer for more than twenty five years, I have supported equipment from PCs to mainframes and most peripherals. I can attest to the fact there will be a discharge of particles from any printer as well as other devices. It happens with lasers, impact, thermal and even inkjet printers. I can come from the consumables, i.e. paper, toner/ink/ribbon or from the wear on equipment parts as well. Has the equipment been properly maintained or moved? Are the users using the recommended consumables in the product? (Not necessarily the manufactures products.) Are the users properly maintaining the equipment? Is there proper airflow and operating temperature around the equipment? Is the equipment being used beyond its duty cycle?
As an example I have seen laser printers moved with the toner cartridge left inside. This results in the toner leaking or dumping into the printer. It cannot be totally removed/cleaned from the device unless you totally strip it down and rebuild it.
Paper dust or particles from component ware will also result in particles being released.
As stated in the original article and in the original study, a further detailed study is needed.
Use common sense.
EBTM
I wouold have to agree with the study’s authors. When I worked at a copy/print shop surrounded by copiers and laser printers, I would shower at night and wash off a layer of black stuff. YUCK!
Roger Knapp
Small amounts of irritants over a long time can cause trouble years later. Asbestos was a good example. And if it was you dieing of cancer, you would be upset and suing someone. I think this study is good for us to pick a brand of laser copier that does not emit these particles when we are in the market for a new one.
You notice HP state that: “we do not believe there is a link between printer emissions and any public health risk”. Sounds like what the cigarette marketers said 60 years ago. They did not say their machines did not emit these particles. They just said there were no health risks reported ….. yet!
http://www.suspendtoram.com MrEvil
I don’t think that those emissions from printers are pure toner. Generally a fully functioning laser printer passes any excess toner into a waste bin in the toner cartridge. If those particulate emissions contained a significant amount of toner it’d be clearly visible in the area the printer is used.
Unfortunately the study made NO effort to determine exactly what those particulates were. Residue from the rollers? Paper dust? Household dust being stirred up by the printer?
The two laser printers I use are pretty old, but if you were to open either of them up to work on them, they’d be exceptionally clean inside. They function properly and only have minute traces of toner loose inside.
Sean
Yes, “freedom” is not wearing your seatbelt and being free to ingest all manner of chemicals and risks you don’t understand because you are too poor to have control over your environment. “If the founding fathers knew that some people were trying to BAN hydrogenated oil, sodium nitrite, sodium nitrate, rBST, synthetic hormones injected into livestock, certain chemical pesticides and fertilizers, why they would be AMAZED and VERY ANGRY!” Yes, they’d be amazed because they’d hardly be able to believe that people were so weak and stupid that they allowed their own lives and those of their families to become a big science experiment conducted for profit by large corporations with no accountability.
The problem with toner particles is that they are SPECIFICALLY DESIGNED TO BE MUCH SMALLER AND LIGHTER THAN ANYTHING YOU FIND IN NATURE because that makes for the best “quality” and speed of printing. The smaller the particle and the more persistent, the higher the likelihood of serious long term health problems. But the cool thing about doing business in America is that people here are like European villagers during the dark ages: they don’t believe something is dangerous unless it kills or injures one of them within a very short period of time after exposure. That’s resulted in all sorts of profitable industries here making and selling things that don’t present any health risk until years of exposure.
Epidemiologists note that at current rates, roughly 1 in 2 men will suffer from cancer in his lifetime. Now, not everyone dies. After radiation therapy and chemotherapy and perhaps $100,000 of chemical and medical treatment and then being banned from the for-profit health insurance system entirely, why there are lots of people who live for a while. I think you should all be free to get chemotherapy and radiation therapy and have the life burned right out of you with the cancer.
America is the best place in the world to do business because you can poison people’s children right in front of them and if anyone complains, they are branded as some sort of freak. “What we need is a little moderation. I’d like to ‘consume’ dangerous chemicals in moderation even though I have no idea what constitutes moderation and the people who do know are keeping it a secret because it affects their profits.”
Xerox makes solid ink printers that PROBABLY do not have this problem because the technology is so different. But who knows if those have some other problem?
There are ZERO legal requirements to test a product or chemical for safety before selling it in the United States. The default rule is that someone has to show that it is unsafe before anything happens. Now who in their right mind is going to spend their own money to test chemical and product safety? There’s no profit in it. And university laboratories and research centers face real risks in conducting such research because it angers the large corporations that provide huge sources of research funding. Do you want the Flora Hewlett Foundation or the Dave and Lucille Packard Foundation to cut your $9 million in annual university funding because you dissed HP’s printers?
I wouldn’t be surprised if those researchers end up with a big grant to pursue some other urgent and unrelated project that takes up all of their time, or alternatively wind up at the bottom of the East River.
When most Americans put money as their top priority (i.e. work at jobs they don’t like for long hours and long commutes while borrowing money to buy little trinkets where that money must be repaid by more hours at that job)… why can’t they imagine that extremely wealthy investors put money first too? If they lost their money, or even stopped making more, they’d have to do what you told them instead of you doing what they tell you to do. You lose money and you lose power and you have to live the crappy life of a poor person. Most rich people would defend their wealth and income to the death.
http://4332 Karen
Testify, Sean!!!
Oliver
I think the author is right. we have to know which brands might cause our health probelm.
We cannot trust manufacturers’s claims such as HP. Agent Orange hasn’t conceded that its most toxic chemical could cause health problems to living creatures. Its own funded researchers are always claiming there are no direct evidences to its chemical suferring patients. the same claims from Tobbaco manufacturers and Mobile phone makers etc. But we consumers should be aware of that.
Some people are very suceptable to certain chemicals some not. Some people could get cancer if they breathe in that tonor particles. For instance, Some of nuclear bomb victims (can’t say the word ‘victim’ to Japs) in Hiroshima live very long saying 70 or over. With this evidence, we can’t say nuclear bomb doesn’t cause human life or health that much.
At least with this article we can get some idea to protect ourselves from money hungry manufacturers . I think readers have choices. Some guys might want to prove this article’s claim so called to have freedom, they might breathe in large quantity of particles from torner directly to prove if it could cause lung cancer or alike. it is totally readers’ choice or freedom.
http://www.ps2works101.com Laser Color Multifunction Printer
I believe with any big piece of technology, printer, computer, etc.. you should have well ventilated area anyways. I do not need to use my printer much at home but I still always open my window when in my computer room whether I use my printer or not.
Kevin
I have a SAMSUNG ML-2510 laser printer and it costed me $100, but a replacement cartridge costed me $97 and I just noticed the toner all over the cartridge. It seems the cartridge releases (leaks) toner. Such an expensive cartridge (the cheapest one costs $97 for just 1500 pages) and faulty. Will never buy anything made by SAMSUNG.