Everyday Exposures Add Up

As mentioned previously, the average woman uses 12 beauty and personal care products every single day.   For teenagers, that number is even higher as they experiment with new and different makeup, beauty products and cosmetics.  And with each of these products comes an ingredient list filled with chemicals and potentially harmful substances.

Welcome…Come right in.

Unfortunately, toxic chemicals in beauty products don’t just stay in the bottle and then magically disappear when you open the lid.   Instead, they are introduced into our bodies every day, with each use.  Similar to the way a nicotine or birth control patch works, ingredients in a lotion, cream or sunscreen are absorbed directly through the skin into the blood.   Inhaling hairspray while applying delivers microdroplets directly to delicate lung tissue.  A fair portion of lipstick or lipbalm, applied to the lips actually goes to the stomach.  In short, as we spray, slather and squirt products, they enter our body through our skin (absorption), our mouth (ingestion) or by breathing (inhaling), where they quickly enter our bloodstream and are carried throughout the body to vital organs.  Their presence in the body can be  verified and detected through simple blood and urine tests.

Did you know?

The average woman consumes 4-9 pounds of lipstick over her lifetime.

Littlest People, Biggest Risk

And while the exposure to adults is worrisome, particularly alarming are the effects that these chemicals have on children.  While they are still growing, kids are physiologically vulnerable.  Their young bodies do not have the detoxification capability of an adult’s, and their brains and immune systems are undergoing periods during which they are especially susceptible to damage or disruption.   Even relatively small exposures– levels that would otherwise be deemed “safe” for adults– can have potentially harmful and permanent effects on our children.  What’s more, the far-reaching effects of these exposures won’t come to light until years later.

10 Very Special People

Perhaps most alarming, even newborns and fetuses aren’t safe from these chemical assaults.  In a groundbreaking study, the Environmental Working Group, a nonprofit group based in Washington D.C., tested 10 Americans for the presence of foreign chemicals in their blood.   But here was the twist:  these samples weren’t taken from adults, with a lifetime of contamination and exposure to measure.  Instead, these special test subjects were newborn babies, and the blood that was being tested was their umbilical cord blood, immediately after delivery.   The alarming results of this study show that babies, instead of being protected and sheltered within the womb, are actually being exposed to chemicals from the mother’s bloodstream.  The EWG study found over 400 unique chemicals in the 10 study participants – an average of 287 chemicals per person.   And most alarming of all, researchers even found chemicals in the newborns that were banned over 30 years ago, further evidence of the long-lasting effects that chemicals have on the body.  Were all of these chemicals from beauty products?  Obviously, no.  But for those thousands of chemicals that are found in beauty and skin care products, it is impossible to deny the role that the mother’s beauty regimen may have in a portion of this chemical count.

Who’s in Charge?

Many consumers are surprised to learn that these chemicals exist – and are even allowed – in our beauty and cosmetic products.   Isn’t someone, some government agency overseeing our beauty industry, they ask?   Unfortunately for U.S. consumers, there is very little oversight of the beauty industry, leaving us to purchase products that are among some of the least-regulated on the market today.

Click here to learn more about the role the U.S. Government and FDA are playing (or not playing) in protecting consumers.