What is in your Makeup bag
Cosmetics have been used for many years and decades by men and women to enhance their beauty, to hide imperfections and the signs of aging, to attract lovers and as fashion statements.
While history teaches us of the natural products our ancestors used, we have still failed to learn from the horror stories from when women painted whitened their faces with toxic mercury and lead.
Even today with our knowledge and experience our personal care products and cosmetics still contain toxic ingredients and known carcinogens. Cosmetics make you attractive, but some of the ingredients in your cosmetics and personal care products may be killing you or seriously damaging your health. Unlike our food, personal care products and cosmetics are not to be as accurate with listing ingredients, which is quite alarming. Once recent food scare involving the Sudan red food dye resulted in large numbers of food products being removed from supermarket shelves as there was reportedly a small risk that this colouring could cause cancer. Our body has a natural way to filter these products and harmful ingredients, unlike carcinogens in creams and lotions which are absorbed through the skin and can enter straight into the blood stream.
What you may not realize is that many of the skin care products and cosmetics you are buying contain ingredients that are not only harmful to your skin, but also to your long term health. Many chemicals found in cosmetics don’t cause immediate visible signs of toxicity, but affect our health negatively over time through repeated use. Every day we are surrounded by thousands of chemicals which we rub onto our skin, spray into the air, and soak ourselves in. There is growing research to prove the potential harm of the chemical cocktail effect; the unknown interactions which occur between chemicals used together in every-day products.
In the US, the FFDCA (Federal Food, Drug and Cosmetic Act) does not require premarket safety tests, reviews or approvals for cosmetics. Enforcement action is only pursued after the product enters into the consumer market and there are complaints.
There are also additional difficulties in removing products that are unsafe, as the rules and regulations are not straight forward. An example of this would be a nail polish remover that contains an ingredient that when ingested, turns to cyanide, which is a serious poison. But because this product is not meant to be consumed internally the FDA would be unable to remove this product from the market place.
According to information in The Safe Shoppers Bible, in 1990 there were 38,000 cosmetic related injuries that needed medical treatment but this figure doesnt include all of the people who suffer from allergic reactions, irritations and photosensitization from using cosmetics, who just accept the symptoms as the normal cost of grooming.
One of the most contact reactions to personal care products and cosmetics is contact dermatitis. The symptoms usually experienced are reddening of the area, itching, swelling and inflammation. This is caused by the skin being irritated or an allergic reaction. Irritation can occur on first contact with something or after repeated contact and usually subsides when contact is stopped. An allergic reaction is when the immune system is affected typically the symptoms can appear 24 to 48 hours after exposure and can increase in severity over the following days.