Cosmetics
When people hear "organic" or "natural" before "makeup" they
often start seeing dollar signs--and lots of them. Fortunately, the demand
for healthier cosmetics has led to new product introductions in a variety of
price ranges. Click on any of the categories below to find cosmetics that will
make you feel truly glamorous without putting a dent in your wallet or
your health at risk, or
read more about why you should
purge your cabinet of those petrochemical-laden products.
Subcategories
Why You Should Look for Healthier Cosmetics
Cosmetics are intended to beautify, and thinking that your favorite lipstick
is full of lead or that your face powder could cause brain damage may not make
you feel as beautiful as you’d like.
Personal Health
An Unregulated Market
The cosmetics industry is perhaps one of the most unregulated industries that
currently exists. Apart from color additives, cosmetic products and ingredients
are not subject to FDA approval before they hit store shelves, and the burden
is placed on companies to validate the safety of their products. Sadly, this
isn’t always done. A recent report from the Environmental Working
Group (EWG), an environmental watchdog agency, revealed that 364 products contained
ingredients being used in applications that the industry’s own Cosmetic
Ingredient Review (CIR) had warned against. For instance, moisturizers
and sunscreens contained ingredients that CIR advised against using in products
intended for skin contact, and
aerosol hairsprays and mousses contained ingredients that shouldn’t have
been used in aerosolized form.
According to the government agency that regulates cosmetics, the FDA's Office
of Cosmetics and Colors, “a cosmetic manufacturer may use almost any
raw material as a cosmetic ingredient and market the product without an approval
from the FDA.” And for those who are unable to ensure the safety of their
product, they can still legally sell it, as long as it comes labeled with the
caveat “Warning: The safety of this product has not been determined.” However,
few products bear that warning. Furthermore, the FDA does not enforce recalls
of products found to be hazardous or defective, leaving it up to the manufacturer
to decide if it will take its dangerous product off the market.
Testing of product ingredients is not only controlled by the
manufacturers but is also voluntary. Not surprisingly then, many
ingredients in cosmetic products are not tested for safety at all. In
fact, EWG revealed in 2004 that 89 percent of 10,500 ingredients
used in personal care products had not been evaluated for safety by the
FDA. This means that companies can market ingredients that are known to
pose potentially serious health risks.
Lacking federal standards, the state of California recently decided to
enforce regulation on its own with the California Safe Cosmetic Act of 2005 that
went into effect January 1, 2007. The law requires companies to report
the use of compounds that appear on the state's Proposition 65 list of
chemicals known to cause cancer, birth defects or reproductive harm. Consumer
advocates hope the law has a "knock on" effect for shoppers nationwide,
given that few companies will want to create separate product
formulations for California and the rest of the U.S.
Problematic Ingredients
Health risks posed by cosmetics can include anything from allergic
reactions to cancer, and the lack of safety standards allows
manufacturers to use some very harmful ingredients, such as Thimerosal,
a preservative that contains neurotoxic mercury, and paraben preservatives,
which have been found in breast tumor samples. For more info on the worst offenders,
see "The
Dirty Dozen Chemicals in Cosmetics."
Cosmetics with sunscreen protection come
with their own worries. Benzophenone (benzophenone-3), homosalate and octyl-methoxycinnamate
(octinoxate) have shown estrogenic activity in lab tests. Padimate-O and Parsol 1789 are
chemicals that have the potential to damage DNA when illuminated with sunlight.
On the skin's surface, the chemicals do protect from UV damage, but once
absorbed, these same chemicals can inflict DNA damage which is less likely
to repair through naturally occurring repair mechanisms than damage from
UV alone. Finally, tiny, microscopic nanoparticles of the sunscreens titanium
dioxide and zinc oxide may enter the body through cuts and abrasions, working
their way into the brain where they may cause cell damage.
Recently, a study by the advocacy group The Campaign for Safe Cosmetics
revealed that randomly selected, store-bought lipsticks contained lead at
levels that exceed the FDA's regulations for lead in food. The lead was a suspected
byproduct of FD&C dyes and of the minerals titanium
dioxide and zinc oxide. While the average daily exposure to the lead in
these products was quite small, they do pose a danger to children who
might eat tubes of lipstick all at once. Unfortunately, companies don't
test for lead in lipsticks on a regular basis, so consumers often have
no way of knowing when a product is contaminated.
Other harmful ingredients found in moisturizers include carcinogenic
coal tar, used in artificial dyes such as FD&C Blue 1
and FD&C
Green 3, and fragrance, which is usually a conglomeration of
chemicals. Because they're protected as "trade secrets," companies aren't required
to disclose every chemical used in fragrances, but those employed often
include hormone-disrupting phthalates; the neurotoxin toluene;
volatile organic compounds methyl ethyl ketone and methyl
isobutyl ketone; the probable carcinogens benzyl
chloride and methylene
chloride; and other allergenic petrochemicals. According
to the American Academy of Dermatology, fragrance is the number one cause of
allergic reactions in cosmetics.
Meaningless Labels
It's not uncommon to find any of the labels below attached to your
favorite cosmetics. The labels sound reassuring, but consumers be
warned: too often these labels have little, if any, meaning.
Fragrance-Free (also "unscented"): Although this term implies that a
product contains no fragrance, companies often add masking fragrances to
cover up a chemical smell. Masking fragrances are sometimes listed as
"fragrance" on ingredient listings.
Hypoallergenic (also "dermatologist tested," "allergy tested,"
"sensitivity tested" or "non-irritating"): For consumers with sensitive
skin, cosmetics with any of these labels may seem like a reassuring
option, but claims that these products produce fewer allergic reactions
are unfounded. The FDA states, "There are no federal standards or
definitions that govern the use of the term 'hypoallergenic.' The term
means whatever a particular company wants it to mean." There are no
organizations behind these claims, and manufacturers are not required to
provide evidence that these products do, in fact, produce fewer allergic
reactions. The FDA also cautions that nearly all cosmetic products can
cause an allergic reaction in some sensitive individuals.
Non-Comedogenic: Although there is no official government definition
of this term, the FDA says that it should mean that the product does not contain
pore-clogging ingredients that could lead to acne. However, the FDA does
not provide a list of ingredients considered non-comedogenic, and no
organization verifies manufacturers' claims. Furthermore, the
reliability of the most common test performed by cosmetic companies to
determine comedogenicity, applying the product to the ears of rabbits,
is heavily disputed because there's no consensus that the results
correlate to experiences in people. The National Institutes of Health
recommends that individuals with acne look for oil-free products.
Cruelty-free (also "no animal testing"): "Cruelty-free" and "no
animal testing" labels suggest that no animal testing was done on the product
or its ingredients, but consumers may be surprised to learn that neither
label guarantees this. No legal definitions of these claims exist and no
independent organization verifies them. In fact, it is not uncommon for
manufactures whose products bear these labels to commission laboratories
to conduct tests on animals and then use the cruelty-free label on the basis
that they themselves do not conduct the testing.
Organic: While the USDA has now set standards allowing personal care
products to be certified organic, they have not set any regulations
against the use of the word "organic" on product labels. As a result,
many manufacturers still use the term as part of a product's name or its
labeling. Products with at least one organic ingredient can be labeled "organic,"
regardless of the other ingredients used. Also, while this isn't legal,
some non-certified manufacturers label products "100% certified organic
ingredients" when only one ingredient is certified organic and the rest
are synthetic, while others have created an official-looking but
meaningless label reading "Made With Certified Organic Ingredients."
Animal Welfare
Animal testing is not required by the FDA or the U.S. Consumer Product
Safety Commission to determine the safety of cosmetic products, yet
animals are commonly used to determine levels of skin irritancy, eye
tissue damage and toxicity caused by ingredients used in personal care
products. The Draize test, for example, measures damage to eye tissue
when potentially caustic substances are dropped in the eyes of conscious rabbits.
Lethal Dosage (LD) tests determine the amount of a substance a subject
can survive ingesting.
Animal testing processes are often painful and cause a multitude of side
effects, but they have not been formally validated for dependability,
and they are widely criticized for being inaccurate predictors of human
hazard. Viable alternatives, such as in vitro tests using human cells
and computer modeling, combined with a wealth of existing safety data
render animal testing unnecessary.
Environmental Issues
Most cosmetics are sold in plastic containers, a product made from
nonrenewable fossil fuels. Too often, these containers aren't recycled
and go straight to landfills. Often, molded
plastic containers, such as in compacts or plastic jars, aren't accepted in
municipal recycling bins. Even when manufacturers claim that
packaging is recyclable because it's made from a recyclable plastic
resin, such as #1 polyethylene terephthalate (PET), recycling
programs won't accept the containers due to their shape or the fact that
the type of plastic resin isn't indicated anywhere on the packaging.
GG Resources
"The Dirty Dozen Chemicals in Cosmetics,"
www.thegreenguide.com/doc/122/dirtydozen
"Personal Care: Natural Instincts,"
www.thegreenguide.com/doc/118/instincts
"Preserving Your Health,"
www.thegreenguide.com/doc/116/preserving
"Allergens in Fragrance,"
www.thegreenguide.com/doc/94/allergens
"The Good, The Bad & The Ugly,"
www.thegreenguide.com/doc/94/goodbadugly
References
American Academy of Dermatology. "Beauty Flash: The Top 10 Cosmetic Do's
& Don'ts for Women With Sensitive Skin," March 2003.
www.aad.org.
American Academy of Dermatology. "Cosmeceutical Facts & Your Skin."
www.aad.org/public/Publications/pamphlets/Cosmetics.htm.
Campaign for Safe Cosmetics. "A Poison Kiss: The Problem of Lead in
Lipstick," October 2007.
www.safecosmetics.org/your_health/poisonkiss.cfm.
Erickson, Kim. Drop-Dead Gorgeous. New York: Contemporary Books, 2002.
Environmental Working Group. "Cosmetics with Banned and Unsafe
Ingredients," September 2007.
www.ewg.org/node/22610.
Malkan, Stacy. Not Just a Pretty Face. British Columbia: New Society
Publishers, 2007.
People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals. "Caring Consumer: A Guide
to Kind Living," www.caringconsumer.org.
Singer, Natasha. "Skin Deep: Should You Trust Your Makeup?" The
New York Times, February 15, 2007.
www.nytimes.com.
Steinman, David. Safe Trip to Eden. New York: Thunder's Mouth Press,
2007
Steinman, David and Epstein, Samuel, M.D. The Safe Shopper's
Bible. New
York: Macmillan Press, 1995.
Winter, Ruth. A Consumer's Dictionary of Cosmetic Ingredients. New York:
Three Rivers Press, 1999.
