If you are born in the 21st century, you would believe that beauty can be bought and worked upon. With so many brands advertising to give you fairness, beautiful hair, blemish free skin and numerous procedures that can remove the wrinkles, age spots and even “work on” your facial features, beauty today can surely be bought at a price. This price was always thought to be money but a closer look reveals that what is at stake really is health, the overall wellbeing that is different from just ‘beauty’.
What if someone told you that the deodorant has an ingredient that can cause cancer, what if the eyeliner that you use contains toxic elements and the your favorite lipstick also has carcinogenic ingredients? This is all true; one third of all cosmetic products contain ingredients that may lead to serious long term effects on health. It is found that women who wear make- up every day of their lives absorb about 5 pounds of chemicals every year.
There are chemicals everywhere, what so great about cosmetics?
The main reason why chemicals in make- up are so harmful even than those we take through our mouths is that they are directly absorbed by the skin. Once the chemicals are absorbed by skin, they quickly enter the blood stream and reach vital organs like brain, kidneys and liver. On the other hand anything eaten is broken down by the saliva and later by the stomach fluids which flush out any harmful material before it reaches the blood stream.
Some studies quote that these chemicals can cause long term effects like cancer, genetic disorders, still births, immune dysfunction and immediate effects like skin rash, allergies, vomiting, cramps etc.
Why isn’t it regulated?
Food and Drug Administration (FDA), US which lays rules and regulations regarding food, beverage as well as cosmetic and skin products does not require the cosmetic manufacturers to register with the FDA. So there is no way of checking and testing the ingredients that are used in cosmetics for safety, which explains why 89% of 10,500 ingredients used in personal care products have not been evaluated for safety.
Here is a list of few dangerous chemicals in your make up:
Parabens: These are a kind of preservatives that are found in almost all ‘leave on’ and most ‘rinse off’ cosmetics. Parabens are dangerous as they disrupt the hormonal balance in humans by mimicking the female hormone called as estrogen which increases the risk of breast cancer in the long run. In men they affect the male reproductive functions.
Pthalates: Phthalates, pronounced as thalates, to lead to malfunctioning of liver, kidneys, lungs as well as reproductive systems. It also affects the hormonal levels and causes low sperm count in men and premature breast development in girls. A study conducted by Women’s Environmental Network and Swedish Study for nature conservation showed that four out of the five popular beauty products contain phthalates.
Lead: Everyone is worried about the presence of lead in toys and paints but no one raises a fuss when lead is found in lipsticks. Lead is toxic when ingested yet FDA has approved of many brands of lipsticks that contain colorants made of lead. Almost 61% of lipsticks contain lead in their composition.
DEA: Diethanolamine is found in shampoos, shaving creams, moisturizers and baby washes so its negative effects are compounded. DEA is easily absorbed by the body and can be converted into nitrosamine, a carcinogen in the presence of other chemicals found in cosmetics. DEA is known to be hormone disrupter and steals away choline needed for brain development.
Triclosan: A common ingredient in anti bacterial hand wash, deodorants, toothpastes and body wash, it is easily absorbed in the body and interferes with the functioning of testosterone production. It also causes the good bacteria to die along with pathogens which lower the immunity of the body. Thus Triclosan may lead to development of resistant strains of bacteria.
There are many other chemicals that have been proven to be carcinogenic agents yet are found in many cosmetic products.
Ok, now how do I avoid these?
You can use herbal and natural cosmetics which lack most of the preservatives, coloring and fragrance agents found in other cosmetics. Read the covers carefully to ascertain if they are actually made from natural ingredients.- The best way to ensure that you use natural products is by following home remedies like instead of buying separate exfoliators, use a mixture of milk and oats or sugar and lemon, for getting rid of dark circles, keep cucumber slices on them and apply almond oil below the area before sleeping.
- Use a good moisturizer. That is generally all that you need for your skin on a daily basis and once your skin is properly moisturized other problems will be solved.
- Contrary to what manufacturers say, you may not need to tone your skin every time you moisturize it. Similarly you can eliminate most of the cosmetics in your regime if you depend on what actually your skin needs rather than what it hyped about.
- Before buying any product, ask for the cosmetic counter for a sample piece; use it on your skin for few days to check if it suits you before buying it.
- Make sure you remove the make- up before you go to sleep. Keeping the make-up on the skin exposes the body to the chemical for a long time and also affects the texture and quality of the skin.
- The best way to care for your skin is not to lather them with cosmetics and creams but eating right. Once you get all the essential nutrients along with plenty of water and good night’s sleep, your skin will glow by itself.
Beauty, they say is only skin deep, but now we know that the chemicals in these products penetrate deep under the skin and increase the long time risk of cancer to those exposed. There is awareness needed from the consumer’s side that will force the manufacturers to stop the use of chemicals found to be harmful and to conduct independent studies that test out the ingredients in cosmetics.
Next time you reapply the lipstick, spare a thought to what goes into it!
