Cosmetics Crisis! What’s That On Your Face?

Lip gloss makes your lips sparkle, but it could also be filling your body with a cocktail of dangerous chemicals. Shockingly, most cosmetics ingredients don’t have to be approved by the Food and Drug Administration (the federal agency that regulates cosmetics), and 90 percent of them have not been tested for safety.

The average woman uses 12 such products a day, each containing up to 175 chemical compounds. Sixty percent of those ingredients are then absorbed into the body—that’s five pounds of chemicals a year!

What exactly makes these ingredients so harmful? Their effects range from skin allergies to cancer to reproductive and developmental abnormalities.

Here are just a few of the offending ingredients that you might be using:

Human and cow placenta: Used in some skin creams and hair conditioners, its hormones can cause toddlers to grow breasts.

Mercury: Known to cause brain damage, it is found in eye drops and in Paula Dorf mascara.

Lead: The government has banned its use in gasoline and house paint because it is toxic to the brain, but it can still be found in some lipsticks and hair dyes.

Hydroquinone: Found in skin lightening products such as Murad Post Acne Spot Lightening Kit, it’s linked to cancer and can cause a disease that creates permanent bumps on your skin.

Nanoparticles: These futuristic-sounding ingredients have not been tested for safety and can travel through the optic nerve into the brain and red blood cells. They are found in products made by Almay, Revlon, L’Oreal, Banana Boat, Olay, Aveeno, Clinique, Maybelline, and more.

Phthalates: These chemicals found in nail polish and fragrances can cause infertility.

Petroleum Byproducts: Produced in factories that make gasoline, they have been linked to cancer and are used in products such as shaving cream by Gillette, St. Ive’s Apricot Scrub, and some baby shampoos.

How can you find out which products to toss and which to try? Easy! For more information, check out www.cosmeticsdatabase.com, www.chemicalsafeskincare.co.uk, and www.safecosmetics.org. These sites provide lists of harmful products and ingredients and recommend safe products for you to try.

Tell all the girls and women you know that these side effects are one more reason for them to embrace their natural beauty. Use your power and raise your voice to tell the cosmetics companies and the Food and Drug Adminstration that we deserve better because, as one popular cosmetics brand puts it, we’re worth it!

Sources: www.cosmeticsdatabase.com, www.chemicalsafeskincare.co.uk, www.safecosmetics.org