Arsenic in the Toothpaste You Bought for Your Kids

EvilCorporations.com • Case No. 1:25-cv-00662, E.D.N.Y. • 26 min read

Colgate-Palmolive Co. and its subsidiary Tom’s of Maine, Inc. are defendants in a federal class action lawsuit alleging they sold children’s toothpaste contaminated with lead and arsenic while listing neither substance anywhere on the packaging. The product, Tom’s of Maine Kid’s Natural Fluoride-Free Toothpaste in Silly Strawberry flavor, was marketed specifically to parents who wanted a safe, natural option for their kids. The lawsuit was filed February 6, 2025. The plaintiff, a Staten Island father named Douglas White, says he gave this toothpaste to his child.

What This Cost That No Dollar Figure Can Cover

Think about what it feels like to do everything right as a parent. You skip the cheap stuff. You read the label. You buy the brand that says “natural” right on the tube, the one with the friendly cartoon and the kid-safe flavor. You squeeze it onto the tiny toothbrush every morning and every night and tell your child to spit, knowing they probably won’t, knowing that’s fine because it’s the safe kind. That moment, that small daily act of protection, is what Colgate-Palmolive and Tom’s of Maine turned into a delivery mechanism for neurotoxins.

There is no safe blood lead level for children. That is not a number someone is still debating in a lab somewhere. That is settled science, stated plainly by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The damage lead does to a developing brain is not like a broken arm. It does not heal. You cannot see it on an X-ray and point to where it hurt. It shows up later, in a child who struggles to focus in school, in a teenager whose anxiety the doctors can’t quite explain, in an adult whose cognition quietly erodes over decades. The complaint cites peer-reviewed research showing that children store more lead in their nervous systems than in their bones compared to adults. The brain gets more of it. The developing brain, the one that is still forming connections that will last a lifetime, absorbs a disproportionate share.

Arsenic works alongside it, compounding the injury. The FDA states directly that children are “particularly vulnerable to the potential harmful effects from arsenic exposure because of their smaller body sizes and rapid metabolism and growth.” Smaller body. Faster metabolism. More surface area for the poison to work. A dose that might register as trace in an adult is proportionally massive in a four-year-old. And children, as the defendants’ own website acknowledges, swallow toothpaste. Tom’s of Maine knows this. Colgate-Palmolive knows this. Their own website contains a bulletin about it. The complaint notes that they tried to “mitigate the inherent risks” of a child consuming uncontaminated toothpaste while saying nothing about what it means to consume toothpaste spiked with lead and arsenic.

Douglas White is not an abstraction. He is a father who bought this product at a brick-and-mortar store in Staten Island. He bought it multiple times. He gave it to his child. He had no way of knowing. No reasonable person commissions a laboratory test before buying toothpaste for a kindergartener. The information was withheld from him by the very companies that possessed it. The complaint is explicit: the defendants “knew that if they had not omitted that the Product contains lead and arsenic, then Plaintiff and the Class would not have purchased the Product at all.”

That sentence describes a calculated business decision. They weighed the disclosure against the sale and chose the sale. Every tube that left the shelf was a bet that parents would never find out. Lead Safe Mama found out. A federal lawsuit now exists because of it. But the damage to the children who were brushing with this product every night before they went to sleep cannot be recalled like a defective part.

The Neurotoxic Damage Colgate-Palmolive Chose Not to Tell You About

The health research cited in the complaint is precise and devastating. These are not general warnings. These are documented dose-response relationships.

• The CDC states there is no safe blood lead level in children. Any detectable lead in a child’s blood is cause for concern, and the CDC’s blood lead reference value of 3.5 micrograms per deciliter places a child in the top 2.5% of children with the highest blood lead levels in the country.
• An increase of only 0.3 micrograms per deciliter of median blood lead is associated with a doubling of the risk of panic disorder in young adults, according to research published in the Archives of General Psychiatry.
• Every 1 microgram per deciliter increase in blood lead concentration is associated with an average loss of 1.37 IQ points, according to research published in the New England Journal of Medicine. That loss is permanent. There is no remediation drug that gives it back.
• Lead ingested by children is stored in the bones and brain and can cause measurable health problems decades later. Chronic low-level lead exposure is linked to cognitive decline and dementia in older adults, meaning a contaminated toothpaste used in childhood is not a childhood problem.
• Children store proportionally more lead in their nervous systems than in their bones compared to adults, meaning the brain bears more of the toxic burden in the population least equipped to absorb it.
• Children found to have blood lead levels above 20 micrograms per deciliter require hospitalization, abdominal X-rays, bowel decontamination, and chelation therapy. Chelation therapy involves administering chemicals that bind to lead in the blood so it can be excreted. It is not a pleasant treatment for a young child.
• Lead exposure increases risks of mental illness, dementia, hypertension, arrhythmia, and breast cancer. These consequences extend across an entire lifetime, not just childhood.
• The FDA explicitly identifies children as “particularly vulnerable” to arsenic exposure because of their smaller body sizes and rapid growth. The FDA’s own guidance on arsenic contamination in food references this, and the complaint cites it directly.

How Colgate-Palmolive Sold Poison With a “Natural” Label

The mechanism of deception here is simple and surgical. The defendants used the packaging itself as the lie.

• The product label lists its ingredients. Lead and arsenic do not appear. There is no warning, no footnote, no asterisk directing a parent to any external disclosure. A reasonable consumer reading the ingredient list is given a complete false picture of what is inside the tube.
• The product is marketed specifically as a natural, safe toothpaste for children. The branding, the flavoring (Silly Strawberry), and the child-focused packaging were all designed to signal safety to parents who were actively trying to make responsible purchasing decisions.
• Defendants operate Colgate.com, which includes a bulletin advising parents on what to do when children swallow toothpaste. The complaint notes that this same website omits any information about the danger of swallowing toothpaste contaminated with lead and arsenic. They acknowledged swallowing risk. They suppressed the contamination disclosure.
• The lawsuit alleges the omission was intentional and material. The complaint states directly: “Defendants knew that if they had not omitted that the Product contains lead and arsenic, then Plaintiff and the Class would not have purchased the Product at all.” This is not an accident omission; it is a calculated commercial decision.
• Consumers have no ability to detect lead or arsenic at the point of sale. You cannot smell it, see it, or taste it. Testing requires a laboratory. The defendants are in the “unique and superior position” of knowing the contamination risk and possessing the ability to test before products are released to market. That position carries legal obligations they allegedly ignored.
• The complaint also flags a prior contamination incident: in 2024, the FDA investigated other Tom’s of Maine products under the same brand for contamination with “mold-like” substances, as reported by NPR. This pattern of contamination at the same brand is cited as evidence that Defendants “are no strangers” to product safety failures.
• The product is legally classified as a cosmetic by the FDA (because it does not contain fluoride). Under 21 U.S.C. § 361, a cosmetic is “adulterated” if it contains a “poisonous or deleterious substance which may render it injurious to users.” The complaint alleges the product meets this definition precisely.

What the Court Filing Actually Says, Word for Word

The following are direct quotations from the complaint filed in the Eastern District of New York on February 6, 2025. No paraphrasing. No editorializing. Their words.

“Defendants have improperly, deceptively, and misleadingly labeled and marketed their Product to reasonable consumers, like Plaintiff, by omitting and not disclosing to consumers on its packaging that the Product is contaminated with unsafe levels of lead and arsenic, which are powerful neurotoxins that are known to cause cognitive deficits, mental illness, dementia, and hypertension.”
— Complaint ¶2

• This paragraph establishes the core legal theory: the harm is not just contamination, it is the omission of the contamination from the packaging. The defendants’ own label becomes the instrument of deception.
• The complaint specifically names cognitive deficits, mental illness, dementia, and hypertension as documented consequences of the very substances they withheld from the ingredient list. These are not speculative risks; they are cited to peer-reviewed literature.

“Defendants knew that if they had not omitted that the Product contains lead and arsenic, then Plaintiff and the Class would not have purchased the Product at all.”
— Complaint ¶47

• This is the intent allegation. The complaint is asserting that the omission was not a mistake or oversight. The defendants understood the commercial consequences of disclosure and chose non-disclosure.
• Under New York’s GBL § 349, a deceptive act qualifies as unlawful even without proof of specific intent to defraud. But this allegation goes further, arguing the concealment was willful and wanton.

“Defendants are in the unique and superior position of knowing the ingredients and raw materials used in the manufacturing of their Product and possess unique and superior knowledge regarding the manufacturing process of the Product… as well as the ability to test the Product for lead and arsenic contamination prior to releasing the Product into the stream of commerce.”
— Complaint ¶42

• This paragraph addresses the “how could they know?” defense before it can be raised. The complaint argues that Colgate-Palmolive and Tom’s of Maine had both the knowledge and the technical capability to detect this contamination before a single tube hit a store shelf.
• The “superior knowledge” doctrine is significant in consumer fraud cases. When one party has information the other cannot reasonably obtain, a duty to disclose arises. This paragraph is laying the groundwork for that legal theory.

“Defendants made the untrue and/or misleading statements and omissions willfully, wantonly, and with reckless disregard for the truth.”
— Complaint ¶82, ¶93

• This exact phrase appears twice in the complaint, once in the GBL § 349 count and once in the GBL § 350 count. Repetition here is deliberate legal strategy. “Willfully, wantonly, and with reckless disregard” is the language that opens the door to treble damages and punitive damages under New York law.
• Treble damages under GBL § 349 can multiply compensatory awards up to three times. Statutory damages of $50 per transaction and $500 per transaction are sought under the two respective statutes, in addition to punitive and compensatory awards.

“That is because Defendants’ Product containing, or at risk of containing lead or arsenic, known dangerous substances, have no value.”
— Complaint ¶21

• This is the “benefit of the bargain” theory expressed at its most direct. The legal argument is that a contaminated product is not a discounted product; it is a worthless product. Consumers did not get what they paid for because what they paid for does not exist.
• This framing matters for damages calculations. If the product is worthless, the injury is the full purchase price, not the difference between a “safe” and “contaminated” version.

The Timeline: From Brand Promise to Federal Lawsuit

Who Pays the Real Price When Corporations Skip Safety

Public Health

The lead and arsenic contamination documented in this lawsuit is a public health issue with consequences that extend across decades and demographics.

• Children who absorbed lead through this toothpaste face documented neurological damage. The harm is dose-dependent and cumulative. Every use added to the child’s total lifetime exposure, and there is no remediation that fully reverses what lead does to a developing brain.
• The CDC’s blood lead reference value threshold of 3.5 micrograms per deciliter triggers mandatory state and local health department reporting, home investigation, and regular monitoring. Children whose levels were elevated by this product may be subject to these interventions without knowing the toothpaste was the source.
• Children with blood lead levels above 20 micrograms per deciliter require chelation therapy, a process in which chemicals are injected or given orally to bind to heavy metals and pull them out of the blood. This is a medical intervention that could have been avoided entirely if the product had not been sold.
• The psychiatric consequences of lead exposure documented in the complaint include doubled rates of panic disorder at just 0.3 micrograms per deciliter of increased blood lead. Mental health conditions triggered by early childhood toxic exposure often manifest in adolescence or adulthood, long after the source is forgotten.
• Chronic low-dose lead exposure is linked to cognitive decline and dementia in older adults. A child using this toothpaste in 2023 could face elevated dementia risk in 2063. The harm horizon on lead poisoning is generational.
• The complaint notes that children swallow toothpaste, a fact the defendants’ own website acknowledges. Oral ingestion of lead and arsenic from toothpaste is not an edge case. It is an expected behavior, particularly in the toddler and preschool age groups this product targets.

Economic Inequality

The financial burden of this contamination falls hardest on families who can least afford it, while the corporations that profited face manageable legal costs.

• Chelation therapy, neurological monitoring, and long-term cognitive intervention for lead-exposed children are expensive medical treatments. Families in lower-income brackets who purchased this product because it was accessible at brick-and-mortar stores face these costs without necessarily having the insurance or resources to cover them.
• The lawsuit describes the product as a “premium” item. Parents paid a price premium for a product marketed as natural and safe. The premium they paid went directly to the defendants’ revenue. The product they received was worthless by the complaint’s own legal argument. That transfer of wealth from trusting parents to a multinational corporation is the economic injury in its plainest form.
• Independent laboratory testing is the only way a consumer could have detected this contamination. That testing is not free, not accessible at point of sale, and not something any normal person does before buying toothpaste. The burden of detection was structurally placed on the consumers, who had no means of meeting it.
• The class action mechanism exists precisely because individual claims may be too small to litigate alone. Statutory damages of $50 per transaction under GBL § 349 and $500 per transaction under GBL § 350 are the tools designed to make corporate accountability financially viable for plaintiffs without deep pockets. Whether those tools are sufficient to meaningfully deter a corporation the size of Colgate-Palmolive is a separate question.
• Colgate-Palmolive Co. is a Delaware-incorporated multinational with its principal place of business in New York City. Tom’s of Maine, Inc. is a subsidiary headquartered in Kennebunk, Maine. The legal and financial resources available to the defendants vastly exceed those available to the plaintiff class of individual consumers.

What the Numbers Actually Mean

What Now: Who to Pressure and What to Do

The lawsuit is filed and moving through the Eastern District of New York. Here is who has jurisdiction over this conduct, and what you can do right now.

Corporate Roles Named in the Lawsuit

• Chief Executive Officer, Colgate-Palmolive Co. (principal place of business: New York, New York)
• President/Chief Executive Officer, Tom’s of Maine, Inc. (principal place of business: Kennebunk, Maine)
• Head of Product Safety and Quality Assurance, Colgate-Palmolive Co.
• Head of Manufacturing and Supply Chain, Tom’s of Maine, Inc.

Specific executive names are not provided in the source filing. The roles above represent the decision-making positions responsible for the conduct alleged.

Watchlist: Regulatory Bodies With Jurisdiction

• FDA (Food and Drug Administration): Has jurisdiction over cosmetics under the FDCA, including the adulteration and misbranding provisions cited in this complaint. The FDA has already engaged this brand over a prior contamination matter. File a MedWatch Safety Report at fda.gov/safety/medwatch.
• FTC (Federal Trade Commission): Has authority over deceptive advertising and marketing practices. The “natural” and “safe” branding on a product containing neurotoxins is a candidate for FTC enforcement. Report at ReportFraud.ftc.gov.
• CPSC (Consumer Product Safety Commission): While jurisdiction is primarily on physical safety, contaminated consumer products may fall within their mandate. File a report at SaferProducts.gov.
• New York State Office of the Attorney General: GBL §§ 349 and 350, the statutes at the center of this case, are the AG’s primary consumer protection enforcement tools. The NY AG office can pursue enforcement on behalf of New York consumers. Contact: ag.ny.gov.
• State AGs Nationwide: The class covers consumers across all 50 states. Your state’s attorney general office has parallel consumer protection authority. If you purchased this product, contact your state AG’s consumer protection division.

What You Can Do: Mutual Aid and Grassroots Action

• If you purchased Tom’s of Maine Kid’s Natural Fluoride-Free Toothpaste in Silly Strawberry flavor, retain your receipts and purchase records. Contact the law firm of record, Sultzer & Lipari, PLLC (thesultzerlawgroup.com), to inquire about joining the class action.
• Talk to your pediatrician about blood lead testing. If your child used this product, request a blood lead test. Testing is the only way to know if exposure occurred. Early detection allows early intervention.
• Share Lead Safe Mama’s testing results (tamararubin.com) directly with every parent in your network. The independent testing that sparked this lawsuit came from a community-funded advocacy researcher. Support her work directly.
• Pressure your local school PTA, day care, and pediatric clinic to remove this specific product from recommended lists. Consumer advocates removing shelf space from contaminated products is faster than regulatory action.
• Demand that retailers including any store where you purchased this product pull it from shelves and issue a public statement. Retailer accountability is not addressed in this lawsuit; consumer pressure is the lever.
• Organize with neighbors and community groups in affected zip codes, particularly in working-class and immigrant communities where premium “natural” products are increasingly marketed as aspirational but where healthcare access for follow-up treatment is limited. The burden of contamination does not distribute equally.
• Follow the case docket at CourtListener.com (Case No. 1:25-cv-00662) or through ClassAction.org. Class action settlements often include opt-in or opt-out deadlines that require active participation from affected consumers to claim damages.