Cosmetics Come Clean

By Bryce Edmonds

You scour the labels on beauty products for toxic buzzwords such as paraben, phthalate, and 1,4-dioxane, but there’s got to be an easier way to shop for clean cosmetics. And there is. The Campaign for Safe Cosmetics, a coalition of nonprofit health, environmental, and consumer groups, has demanded that the unregulated beauty industry dump the toxins from their products and has made a shopping list of who’s being naughty and nice. More than 600 companies have signed the Campaign’s Compact for the Global Production of Safe Health and Beauty Products—check out www.safecosmetics.org for the complete list—and pledged to replace ingredients linked to cancer, birth defects, hormone disruption, and other negative health effects with safer alternatives. The signers also committed to meet the European Union’s strict standards and report publicly on their progress. Some companies familiar to Alternative Medicine readers have signed the Compact—Jane Iredale Mineral Cosmetics, Pangea Organics, and Zia Natural Skincare—while some household names have refused—L’Oréal, Revlon, Estée Lauder, Avon, and Procter & Gamble. For ways to encourage the makers of your favorite beauty products to clean up their formulas, check out the “Take Action” section on the safe cosmetics website.

Consumer action helped the campaign persuade OPI, the largest maker of salon-quality nail polish, to remove two of its most toxic ingredients—dibutyl phthalate and toluene. OPI still uses formaldehyde, but “is actively looking for alternatives,” according to Marisa Walker, spokesperson for the Breast Cancer Fund, one of the campaign’s members.

To coincide with National Breast Cancer Awareness Month, campaign member Stacy Malkan, of Healthcare Without Harm, is touring in October to talk about her exposé on chemicals in cosmetics, Not Just a Pretty Face: The Ugly Side of the Beauty Industry (New Society Publishers, October 2007). Get details at www.safecosmetics.org.