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    A Blogger Forced Crest Toothpaste To Remove Plastic Pieces

    A dental hygienist's blog about potentially harmful microbeads went viral. Crest has promised to remove the plastic beads, though maintains that they're up to ADA standards.

    Crest Pro Health toothpaste contains a plastic microbead:

    Dental hygienist Trish Walraven noticed something familiar in toothpaste her daughter picked out at the store. It contained little blue microbeads that she had been seeing stuck in the gumlines of her patients at her dental practice.

    She posted a blog entry to her site, Dental Buzz, warning readers to avoid Crest Pro Health toothpaste, since she believes that the microbeads, which are made of a polyethane plastic, are getting stuck in people's gums and leading to gum health issues.

    "I've been seeing these blue particles flush out of patients' gums for several months now," she wrote. "So has the co-hygienist in our office. So have many dental hygienists throughout the United States and Canada who have consulted with each other and realized that we have a major concern on our hands."

    Tricia Walraven said she had seen blue beads stuck in her patient's gums:

    The blog entry went viral on Facebook and prompted many customers to reach out to Crest to complain.

    A spokesperson for Proctor & Gamble, which owns Crest, referred BuzzFeed News to a statement from the American Dental Association, which has given the toothpaste its seal of approval. The ADA statement says, "clinically relevant dental health studies do not indicate that the ADA Seal should be removed from toothpastes that contain polyethylene microbeads."

    However, Crest toothpaste is going to start removing the microbeads from its products due to customer demand, according to its official Twitter account.

    "According to customer preference", Crest will remove the microbeads from their formula:

    @Iameverythang Due to consumer preference, the majority of our toothpastes will be microbead-free by March of 2015. Thanks!