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Dr. Mercola
April 05 2008
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Carcinogens Found in "Organic" Personal Care Products

body lotion, personal care productsA new study commissioned by the Organic Consumers Association (OCA) found that many leading "natural" and "organic" brand shampoos, body washes, and lotions contain the carcinogenic contaminant 1,4-Dioxane.

1,4-Dioxane is considered a chemical "known to the State of California to cause cancer.” It is a byproduct of the cancer-causing petrochemical Ethylene Oxide, which is used as part of a short-cut process called Ethoxylation, which makes harsh ingredients milder.

1,4-Dioxane is also suspected of being a kidney toxicant, neurotoxicant and respiratory toxicant, among others, according to the California EPA. It is also a leading groundwater contaminant.

Some of the leading organic and natural brands found to contain 1,4-Dioxane include:
  • JASON Pure Natural & Organics
  • Giovanni Organic Cosmetics
  • Kiss My Face
  • Nature’s Gate Organics
To avoid 1,4-dioxane, OCA recommends reading ingredient labels and avoiding products with indications of ethoxylation, which include: "myreth," "oleth," "laureth," "ceteareth," any other "eth," "PEG," "polyethylene," "polyethylene glycol," "polyoxyethylene," or "oxynol," in ingredient names.

Dr. MercolaDr. Mercola's Comments:
I know you may be tempted to throw up your hands in dismay that even your natural and “organic” soaps, body lotions, cosmetics, and shampoos may be harmful, but there are some safe personal care products on the market.

And once you know what to look for, and perhaps more importantly, what to avoid, finding them is not that difficult.

Beware of “Greenwashed” Personal Care Products

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration does not require companies to test their personal care products for safety. What this means is that anyone can throw together a medley of chemicals, add a bit of synthetic fragrance, and call it a body lotion. Yes, this is also true for products that are labeled “natural” and even “organic.”

Now let me say this again: cosmetics and their ingredients do not have to undergo any type of approval process before hitting store shelves, and the terms “natural” and “organic” have no definitions. In other words, when it comes to cosmetics labeling, it’s a free for all.

Some products may include a few organic ingredients, for instance, along with several chemical ones -- and still claim to be natural or organic on the label.

 Of course, organic personal care items have been all the rage recently, and sales of organic personal care items reached $350 million in 2007, increasing 24 percent from 2005.

But if you read Tuesday’s newsletter, then you know that giant corporations are often behind popular organic products. And many of these products are greenwashed to make them appear natural and healthy on the outside, when in reality they contain synthetic ingredients that can harm your health, like 1,4-Dioxane.

Ingredients to AVOID in Your Personal Care Products

You wouldn’t knowingly rub a bunch of chemicals on your skin, would you? Well, that’s often what happens every day when people slather on lotion, apply makeup or wash their hair. Is using a typical body lotion for a day going to kill you? Well, of course not.

But every product that you put on your body gets absorbed directly into your bloodstream. And over time these chemicals add a significant burden to your body, and that burden can manifest into disease.

So when choosing your personal care products, keep in mind that the ingredients should be safe enough to eat, since that is essentially what you are doing when you apply something onto your skin.

Yet, even if you did happen to eat these chemicals, your digestive system can produce specific enzymes to break down these toxins and excrete them … something that doesn’t readily occur when you absorb them through your skin. So you really do need to be careful.

The only way to be sure of what’s in your personal care products is to become familiar with which ingredients to avoid, and then check the labels of every product before you buy it. Here are some of the major ones that you will definitely want to avoid:
  • Paraben, a chemical found in underarm deodorants and other cosmetics that has been shown to mimic the action of the female hormone estrogen, which can drive the growth of human breast tumors.
  • Phthalates, plasticizing ingredients (present in nearly three-quarters of 72 products tested by the Environmental Working Group), which have been linked to birth defects in the reproductive system of boys and lower sperm-motility in adult men, among other problems.
  • Musks, used as fragrances, can accumulate in your body, and have been linked to skin irritation, hormone disruption, and cancer in laboratory studies.
  • Artificial fragrances, which are among the top five known allergens, and can cause asthma and trigger asthma attacks.
  • Methylisothiazolinone (MIT), a chemical used in shampoo to prevent bacteria from developing, which may have detrimental effects on your nervous system.
  • Toluene, made from petroleum or coal tar, and found in most synthetic fragrances. Chronic exposure linked to anemia, lowered blood cell count, liver or kidney damage, and may affect a developing fetus.
  • Mineral Oil, Paraffin, and Petrolatum, these products coat your skin like plastic, clogging pores and creating a build-up of toxins. They also slow cellular development, which can cause you to show earlier signs of aging, and are a suspected cause of cancer and disruption to hormonal activity.
This is only a sampling of the toxic ingredients that are out there. If you are wondering whether your favorite personal care products are safe, the Environmental Working Group’s Skin Deep Cosmetic Safety Database allows you to look up a product and find out.

Or Better Yet, Use Only Products With Ingredients That You Can Read and Pronounce

This is probably the simplest way to find safe products out there. If it includes a lot of long, complex ingredient names, it’s probably not safe.

Fortunately, your search for safe skin care may soon get a lot easier. I am proud to report that my team has been researching this topic extensively and we are getting very close to launching one of the best, most pure skin care product lines out there. It is truly effective, has absolutely no synthetic ingredients, and is packaged in brown glass bottles.

But for now, we’re talking about your health here, so please do be choosy and only use products made of real, recognizable, natural and organic ingredients.
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Community Comments ( 120 )
 Comment on this Article
  
  
libertyinmo
 [ Joined on 03/08 ] [ Posted on March 20, 2008 ]
27 Points        
   
 
Novice User
After looking up the ingredients in my so-called natural products and discovering that there were lots of unnatural chemicals in them, we decided to make our own soap. The only main ingredients are:  fats, lye and water. My daughter decided to add cocoa powder for a chocolate scent. Then, she used the soap to make shampoo by adding extra water and used pectin to make it thicker. She followed a recipe in a soap  making book we have.  My son found a recipe for hair gel on the internet that only uses flax seed and water.  It works extremely well and only takes minutes to make.  If we all get back to the basics and learn to make a lot of our own products, we won't need to worry about what corporations put in their products.  In addition to having better products, we will save money.  In the future, we are even going to try to make our own lye.  You make it by running water through wood ash. Since we heat with wood, we have plenty of wood ash laying around.
 [ Reply ]
Mercola
  
sobber
 		[ Joined on 10/07 ]  [ Posted on April 5, 2008]
9 Points        
   
This user is BELOW novice level and all their comments need to be reviewed with great caution.
  Mercola

ladies please stop using anything on your faces and bodies ; men hate colored,scented,refurbished faces and bodies ; period.
Mercola
  
Barbiec1953
 		[ Joined on 06/06 ]  [ Posted on April 5, 2008]
7 Points        
   
Novice User
  Mercola

Dear Sobber, I hope, fot the most part, what you say is true.

I am a woman but it distresses me to see people reconfiguring

their bodies in such a drastic way.  I understand if you are

disfigured... but to erase some things that are your genetic

background sends a wrong message to our chidren... what you

are intrinsicly is ugly and you need to change it to something

else.  And the breast implants, to me, are so blatently ugly

and obvious.  Why would you want to attract someone who is

attracted to your huge chest ?  What if they ended up leaking

and/or disfiguring you... would he stay with you once they're

gone from that or a mastectomy ?  It's scary to think we've

been bewitched by such shallow things.
Mercola
  
snowburn5
 		[ Joined on 07/06 ]  [ Posted on April 6, 2008]
2 Points        
   
Novice User
  Mercola

Sobber, its cute how you assume most women use "anything" on our faces and bodies for men.  I moisturize my skin so it doesn't itch, stretch, or cause me discomfort. I scent it with lavender because it soothes me. Not because I'm trying to impress men who aren't worth impressing, especially when they assume all my hard work of slathering on this and that is for their enjoyment.  

Use what you will or won't on your body, and leave others to their own.  And don't flatter yourself, its not for you.

Mercola
  
LadyPam
 		[ Joined on 02/08 ]  [ Posted on April 7, 2008]
-2 Points        
   
Apprentice User
  Mercola

Liberyinmo, this is great that you're making your own. I'd be careful making my own lye as you then don't have a standardised strength and, as you know, soapmaking can be dangerous. But I'm sure you're well informed. I'm surprised you have to add anything to THICKEN soap - unless your lye is potassium hydroxide (used for making liquid soap) instead of the more usual sodium hydroxide.

Mercola
  
pbpace
 		[ Joined on 06/06 ]  [ Posted on April 7, 2008]
2 Points        
   
Novice User
  Mercola

Wow snowburn5! You sound very angry! I have to agree with Sobber. Most women I know wear makeup to impress either men or women.
  
  
wesme01
 [ Joined on 10/07 ] [ Posted on April 5, 2008 ]
8 Points        
   
 
Novice User

Use Dr. Bronner's.  It is USDA certified organic.  I use it for everything.  Washing hair, face, body.  I even use it for cleaning. It is the only soap that I have found that is great for my children's sensitive skin. The almond-hemp 18-1 is great for hard wood floors, cleaning sinks, drains, stains in clothing, my carpet, and I even use it on my dog.  Plus, you'll get a kick out of reading the label on the entire bottle.

 [ Reply ]
Mercola
  
eatreal
 		[ Joined on 02/08 ]  [ Posted on April 5, 2008]
1 Points        
   
Novice User
  Mercola

Dr. Bronner's is Fair Trade too. My favorite home cleaning soap is the Sal Suds. Balsalm Fir Oil makes it smell awesome (not overwhelming or fake pine-sol like at all) and it work greats as a dish soap and a hand soap too.

Did you know that the FDA allows up to 10ppm dioxane in foods? While Dr. Mercola states that eating it may be "sort of" safer than absorbing it through the skin, I have to say that the OCA really ought to blow the lid off the exposure to this in processed foods, too.
Mercola
  
Barbara M
 		[ Joined on 04/07 ]  [ Posted on April 5, 2008]
2 Points        
   
Novice User
  Mercola

Dr. Bronner's is the greatest. Why would anyone use anything else?
Mercola
  
ToothChick
 		[ Joined on 12/07 ]  [ Posted on April 5, 2008]
6 Points        
   
Novice User
  Mercola

I love Dr. Bronner's!  The almond is my favourite.... Don't use the peppermint soap 'down there'! =)
Mercola
  
nast
 		[ Joined on 06/06 ]  [ Posted on April 5, 2008]
1 Points        
   
Novice User
  Mercola

Dr.Bronner's has simply the best products.  I have been using it for everything.  Sal suds is wonderful for all house cleaning- from dishes to laundry. The soaps are mild and wonderful even for newborns
Mercola
  
LaurenBW
 		[ Joined on 06/07 ]  [ Posted on April 5, 2008]
1 Points        
   
Novice User
  Mercola

Sal Suds contains sodium lauryl sulfate.
Mercola
  
Joan Courtenay
 		[ Joined on 01/07 ]  [ Posted on April 10, 2008]
       
   
This user is BELOW novice level and all their comments need to be reviewed with great caution.
  Mercola

My husband and I have used Dr. Bonner's bar soap for years. He has sensitive skin so he uses the Baby soap bar while I love the Lemon soap bar. We tried Dr. Bonner's liquid soaps and shampoo but didn't like their odor. However, their bar soaps fragrances are subtle and very pleasant. As far as we're concerned there's nothing like Dr. Bonner's bar soap and we tried just about everything. Also, Burt's Bees products are very good. Their lip balm is the best, as are their lip stains.

Also, thanks to Dr. Mercola and others for outing Jason's and Kiss my Face, I was always uncomfortable with their attention to marketing. They're everywhere.
  
  
Curious26
 [ Joined on 02/08 ] [ Posted on April 6, 2008 ]
7 Points        
   
 
Novice User

First of all, "everything on your skin" does NOT get "directly" absorbed into your bloodstream. Or even reach your bloodstream at all. Most things do NOT. That is the purpose of skin, it's a barrier. Anyone here with a first year Biology course knows that. Most molecules are far too large to be absorbed through skin. Think about it...if that was the case, yes, that ONE time of touching body lotion with chemicals would have put you in the hospital or killed you. Things like Nicotine patches are *designed* to work the way they do by Pharmaceutical companies...I doubt anyone who makes shampoo wants to do the same. They want to  keep you as a customer, not kill you.

People are breathing in toxic fumes from inside and outside every day. Is your paint in your home organic? Your flooring? Your sheets? Your clothing?

While there is nothing wrong with wanting to buy only organic beauty products, I personally think that food is where you should put your money instead.  Grow your own if you can.

Sensationalist claims that are UNPOVEN and FALSE make Americans look dumb. That's the last thing Americans need...information from a "alternative" source doesn't make it correct either.

I agree with Mercola on many things, and like him a lot, but he's got to stop making unproven claims in order for most of us with education to take him seriously. He's so right on the money with some things, so out there with others. I wish he'd walk a straighter line so he gets the respect he deserves.

 [ Reply ]
Mercola
  
LadyPam
 		[ Joined on 02/08 ]  [ Posted on April 7, 2008]
       
   
Apprentice User
  Mercola

Curious26, thanks for this. I get a bit tired of this "Everything gets absorbed" nonsense as well.

However, some things DO get absorbed, among them nasties like sodium laurel sulphate; it does have a molecular size small enough to get through the skin, and it accumulates in vital organs. It's in mainstream 'soaps' (even many solid bars that customers believe to be soap - they're NOT soap, they're hardened detergents!), shower gels, shampoos and toothpastes. It's even in some popular moisturisers - heaven knows why! - and some medicines.

Mercola