Hi Misha,
I think that a “healthy” mattress is somewhat of a misnomer. A mattress needs to provide for healthy sleeping which is mostly a function of PPP (Posture and alignment, Pressure relief, and Personal preferences) and the materials need to be “safe” from toxins and offgassing but healthy sleeping is more about the performance and function of the mattress and safety is more about the chemical composition or type of materials in the mattress and they are really two separate issues. A mattress can use “safe” materials and still not be the best design for healthy sleeping for your specific body type, sleeping style, and individual circumstances. There is more about the more important factors involved in healthy sleeping in post #4 here.
The best way to find out if a mattress is a good match in terms of PPP is with careful and objective testing using the testing guidelines in the tutorial post.
The best way to determine the relative “safety” of the materials is with their certifications.
Magniflex is an Italian company that ships their products around the world. The foams they use come from GommaGomma which makes some high quality foams including latex, memory foam, and polyfoam.
Outside of comparing two mattresses based on their suitability or “safety” … when you are comparing two mattresses in terms of quality or value then you would need to know the thickness and type of foam used in every layer of the mattress and the density of any polyfoam and memory foam and the type and blend of any latex to make meaningful comparisons between mattresses in terms of quality and value because durability and the useful life of a mattress would also be an important part of most people’s personal value equation. GommaGomma (and others) use small amounts of water in their chemical formulations for memory foam and polyfoam which reacts with other chemicals to create the “bubbles” in the foam. This is called water blown foam (vs using various gasses or other types of chemical reactions to create the bubbles). European foam producers often use an isocyanate (one of the two main chemicals used to make polyfoam and memory foam) called MDI to make their foam rather than TDI which is used more commonly in North America. This can produce polyfoam and memory foam that can pass the OekoTex certification which is a more stringent certification than CertiPur which is more commonly seen with North American foams. OekoTex is the same “safety” certification that is used to test for the use of harmful substances and offgassing in most latex materials.
Latex is generally a more durable material than polyfoam and memory foam as well (and usually more costly) but there are also higher and lower quality versions of polyfoam and memory foam and the biggest factor in the durability of both is the density of the foams in a specific mattress. I would also keep in mind that the shipping costs of a mattress from Italy to North America will play a role in its cost which is sometimes a reason why some mattresses that use lower quality or less costly materials are in the same budget range as more costly materials such as latex.
You can read a little more about Magniflex in post #6 here and a forum search on “Magniflex” (you can just click this) will bring up some more information and feedback as well.
There is much more information about how to choose a mattress and make meaningful quality and value comparisons in the tutorial post that dn linked as well.
Phoenix