Are Your Beauty Products Killing You?

[Guest guest]

http://www.alternet.org/story.html?StoryID=13530

Are Your Beauty Products Killing You?

Matt Wheeland, AlterNet

July 4, 2002

If you got out of the shower this morning, blow-dried your hair and gave

your 'do a spritz of VO5 hairspray, you've just poisoned yourself a little

bit. If you do this every morning as your regular routine, you are

accumulating these poisons by the bucketful. But it's not just VO5 that

could make you sick. Try Secret Sheer Dry deodorant, or the suitably named

Poison, a perfume by Christian Dior. In fact, 52 popular cosmetics are now

proven to have toxic components in varying concentrations -- and they're all

over the place.

A report released jointly July 10 by Coming Clean, the Environmental Working

Group and Health Care Without Harm details the extent to which a toxic

family of chemicals known as phthalates (THAY-lates) are used in everyday

household products, especially beauty products like nail polish, lipstick

and perfumes.

The report, titled " Not Too Pretty: Pthalates, Beauty Products and the FDA, "

has its basis in a 1999 FDA study of toxins in the general population of the

U.S. From a sample of 1,029 people, every one of them tested positive for

phthalates in their blood or urine. Scientists at the Centers for Disease

Control singled out a subgroup of 289 people with a particularly high

incidence of phthalates: women of childbearing age. These women were found

to have daily exposures of phthalates ranging from 2.5 to 22 times the

normal for the rest of the general population, with 5 percent showing levels

of 75 percent or higher of the acceptable daily amounts.

Judging from the 5 percent of women with dangerously high test results, it

can be assumed that every day, as many as two million women of childbearing

age are exposed to toxic levels of phthalates.

Phthalates have been shown to cause a wide array of health problems, from

liver and kidney failure to heart, lung and blood pressure problems. The

most worrisome aspect by far is the phthalates' effect on the reproductive

development of fetuses and infants, particularly the reproductive tracts of

males.

Phthalates are metabolized in humans once ingested or absorbed through the

skin. In pregnant women, phthalates pass through the placenta to be absorbed

by the fetus. In nursing women, phthalates are found in breast milk, which

means infants are ingesting these chemicals as they develop. In male

fetuses -- and infants especially -- the phthalates have been shown to cause

testicular atrophy and a reduced sperm count, among other serious health

problems.

Dr. Safe of Texas A & M University notes that some in the medical

community have expressed concerns about phthalate exposure and human health.

" It's hard to be specific until more medical data is available, " Dr. Safe

says, " but if people have concerns, they should limit their use of these

products. "

The HCWH report is the first to document and link the deleterious effects of

phthalates to male reproductive development. Women of childbearing age were

shown to be the most at-risk demographic, and it is reasonable to attribute

this in large part to one fact: the beauty industry. According to Charlotte

Brody, executive director of HCWH, " With all the variables involved, the

only one that doesn't apply on a large scale to both men and women is the

use of cosmetics. "

Global Pollutants

Phthalates are plasticizers. In cosmetics, they are used to add texture and

luster to the product. Ninety percent of the world's plasticizers are used

to soften PVC (vinyl) and make it pliable. The other 10 percent have been

used in many kinds of manufacturing for 30 years, beginning with medical

products like IV bags, gloves and blood bags, but also paints, lubricants,

adhesives, toys, food containers, and, of course, cosmetics.

The use of phthalates in manufacturing is widespread, and has such a long

history that phthalates have wormed their way into every corner of the

globe. Traces are present in virtually every person on the planet. The

phthalate DEHP has been found in Antarctica and in deep-sea jellyfish 3,000

feet below the ocean's surface.

Different phthalates can be found in consumer products like shower curtains,

umbrellas, adhesives, children's toys, and countless other manufactured

goods. PVC, being incredibly cheap to produce, is the preferred product for

the world's manufacturers. With phthalates, you can easily turn PVC into any

number of products.

Turning the Tide

Since the FDA does not regulate the use of pthalates in cosmetics and beauty

aids, manufacturers are not required to disclose them as ingredients.

Says the report: " Taken as a whole, the lab results indicate that a

substantial fraction of cosmetics companies may be hiding phthalates on

store shelves within the containers of their products, with no warning for

pregnant women who might want to avoid purchasing products that contain

chemicals linked to birth defects. "

DEHP, the primary phthalate found in medical supplies, has been found toxic

in studies of patients who spend considerable amounts of time in hospitals,

mainly newborns and the elderly. But other phthalates, including DEP, DBP,

BBP, DCP, DOP and DINP, were last studied nearly 20 years ago.

According to FDA spokesperson Rawlings, " Phthalates were shown to

be safe for topical use in 1984, and there have been no further studies by

the FDA on this subject since then. "

In a recent Dallas Morning News story on phthalates and the cosmetics

industry, Rod Irvin, a spokesman for the American Chemistry Council's

Phthalate Esters Panel, said that " [p]hthalates are among the most-studied

products out there. They have a long record of safe use, with no reports or

evidence of harm to human health. " Additionally, the industry group has

spent " millions " studying the compounds and has found no reason for concern.

In November 2000, the Environmental Working Group released a report that

stated, " Phthalates are recognized as toxic substances under environmental

law, but companies are free to use unlimited amounts in cosmetics. "

The FDA in the past has considered each of these phthalates separately when

studying their toxicity. If you're a dialysis patient, then you're at risk

for poisoning because you're getting twice the amount of DEHP recommended

with each visit. That's bad. But if you're a dialysis patient and you wear a

lot of makeup and spend a lot of time playing with your grandchildren and

their toys, your exposure could be deadly.

Not in the many-faceted eyes of the FDA, though. Its consideration of

disparate exposure to phthalates is the main loophole manufacturers use to

claim that phthalates are safe. Without recognizing that all members of the

phthalate family accumulate to cause the same health problems, phthalate

manufacturers are able to claim that each individual chemical is not harmful

at the documented levels.

HCWH tested 72 of the following kinds of cosmetics: Nail polish, fragrances

(perfumes, body oils, etc.), hairsprays, deodorants and lotions. Fifty-two

of these contained phthalates as ingredients, though none were listed on the

labels. Most of the phthalate-containing products are household names: Aqua

Net Professional Hair Spray; Degree Original Solid Deodorant; Nivea Créme

lotion; Arden's Red Door fragrance; Calvin Klein's Eternity

perfume.

As Brody of HCWH points out, this is just the beginning: " It's impossible to

know without testing which products contain phthalates. Just because some of

the lotions we tried tested negative doesn't mean [all lotions are] clean. "

Until the manufacturers are required to label phthalates, there's no way to

know for sure.

Early Warnings

This is only the latest in a long series of warnings about the dangers of

phthalates, which have been used extensively since the early 1970s. The

biggest commotion over phthalates came in 1998, when the Danish government

issued a well-publicized ban on toys containing phthalates because of

concern that children were being exposed to toxic chemicals when they put

toys in their mouths. Lego, the Danish toymaker, quickly responded by

reformulating its toy factories to phase out the use of phthalates in

production of its toys.

Since then, there has been steadily growing awareness of the dangers of

phthalates. Network news programs have discussed the dangers in toys,

cosmetics and beauty products, and even in fish that live in polluted

waters. Despite all this, the battle against phthalates has been a

stalemate: The EU continues to extend its temporary ban on toys for children

aged 3 and under, but European manufacturers are lobbying to institute a

voluntary reporting system for all other products similar to what is in

place in the U.S.

Malkan of HCWH is urging people to distribute the lists of

phthalate-containing products far and wide, to discuss the topic of

phthalates in cosmetics and medical supplies with their health care

provider, and to contact the FDA to demand an industry-wide ban on

phthalates in cosmetic products. In addition, the groups releasing the

report are preparing to launch a national ad campaign.

As the report makes clear, non-toxic alternatives are readily available:

" The limited testing done for Not Too Pretty reveals that the same big

companies that produce phthalate-laced beauty products, also make similar

products without phthalates ... L'Oreal markets Jet Set nail polish without

DBP but puts the phthalate in its Maybelline brand. "

Without public pressure, however, there will be no incentive for the $20

billion-a-year cosmetics industry to phase out all phthalates. And women who

continue to douse themselves in Christian Dior's Poison may be helping the

perfume live up to its name.

For more information and the complete list of tested products, go to

NotTooPretty.org.

Matt Wheeland is an editorial intern at AlterNet.org.