They SAY It's Good For Your Skin! (Part 1)
by Christine Wolfe
updated 12 months ago
Published on: October 19, 2003
article reprinted from Suite101.com
Introduction
Just as with food labels, American cosmetic-industry labels rank ingredients by order of quantity: There is more of the first than the second, more of the second than the third and so forth and so on. The ranking number of each of the nineteen chemicals in the product I researched is preceded by a "#".
It is important to remember that, although individual chemicals can be bad for you (after all, one of the chemicals used in making soap is lye), the end product is not necessarily hazardous to you. It is also important to remember that some chemicals are hazardous to you only once a certain amount is used; for example, you might be safe using something in a strength of four percent but not one in a strength of five percent.
The hazards specified below are for the pure chemical components of the skin-care product I used to research this article. However, if you have sensitive skin, you may well have either an allergic response or a toxic response to a chemical which might not bother someone with normal skin. If you have hypersensitive skin or if you have multi-chemical sensitive skin (as I do), your threshold for tolerance may be even lower.
As for the ability of chemicals to be mutagens, that is, to change genes, not much is known, perhaps because we are still too close to the end of the Human Genome Project. Unless I have found specific information to the contrary, information about the mutagenicity of individual chemicals is not included in the summaries below.
Please note that biting creatures can be venomous not poisonous whereas plants and chemicals can be poisonous but are never venomous. Venom is poisonous.
The sources I used are in English; however, I did not restrict myself to American sources; indeed, I found those in Europe to be of far greater interest than American ones. I did restrict myself to either governmental, organizational or chemical sources. It is my intention to show what the industry knows, not what other individuals' experience has been. I do not seek to belittle them: Their opinions show the degree to which controversy surrounds some chemicals and their actions have probably helped make chemical information more available, for which they have my thanks.
The skin-care product I selected is one you can get in almost any drugstore in the US.
#01. Purified water is the product's major component. Contrary to popular belief, water dries your skin if you use it topically; it only moisturizes if you drink it. If you have dry skin as I do, you will have seen the truth of this. Purified water has no hazard rating although it does re-act with some metals (it will rust some, for example).
#02. Sesame oil (Sesamum indicum) is one of several vegetable oils used in the cosmetic industry as a carrier oil (aka base or fixed oil). However, since the formulation of this product is one of having sesame oil in it, its presence is more likely that of being able to add vitamin E to the product as well as to serve as its principal emollient. Sesame oil has no hazard rating, either, although it will catch fire if you heat it and expose it to a flame.
Purified water and sesame oil form the backbone of this skin-care product. Some of the other chemicals it contains prevent discoloring (anti-oxidants), some soften your skin (emollients, including sesame oil), some keep oil and water together (emulsifiers), some maintain the emulsion (emulsion stabilizers), some make a product penetrate your skin more than it might otherwise (enhancers), some give the product a fragrance other than the one its components would normally lend it (fragrance), some attract and/or bind water (humectants), some add water (moisturizers), some make the end product opaque (opacifiers), some prevent the end product from sprouting fungi or growing microbes (preservatives), some make other chemicals behave differently than they originally would (sequestrators), some are wetting agents (surfactants), some give the end product a good feel (texturizers), some make it thicker (thickeners) and some make it pourable (viscosity adjusters).
#03. Isopropyl myristate Isopropyl is derived from propane, a gaseous and flammable component of petroleum. Myristic acid, a fatty acid, can be derived from most vegetable and animal fatty acids, but most especially from nutmeg (Myristica fragrans), palm seed fats, milk fat and sperm whale (Physeter catodon) fat.
Isopropyl myristate is an enhancer, although it is not known how it does this.
In its pure form, isopropyl myristate is flammable; it re-acts with strong oxidizing agents; it is not a known carcinogen or teratogen. It is not known to be poisonous to swallow. Isopropyl myristate is a known irritant of eyes, skin and respiratory systems!
For the life of me, I can't figure out why anyone in good conscience would use a known skin-irritating chemical in a skin-care product! I stopped using this one when I finished the research on this, its third largest component. The skin on my arms is still dry, but at least I no longer have funny, itchy, scaly patches on them. So much for trusting a long-trusted brand name!
#04. Glycerin (aka glycerol) is a by-product of the manufacture of soap. It can be made from beef lard or from a variety of vegetable oils; in my case, guaranteed beef lard would be the safest, since I have a contact allergy to several of the fruits and vegetables often used in soap-making.
The cosmetic industry tends to view glycerin as a humectant as well as an emollient. Other industries use it as a lubricant, an anti-freeze, a solvent, a denaturant and in food, as an emulsifier, a thickener and a stabilizer.
The pure form of glycerin isn't a poison, a carcinogen or a teratogen. It is incompatible with perchloric acid, lead oxide, acetic anhydride, nitrobenzene, chlorine (used in swimming pools and many public water systems) and peroxide (as in hydrogen peroxide or hair-color-changing peroxide). It is flammable. It is edible. It can be an eye or respiratory-system irritant. Repeated use can dry your skin!
The known skin hazard of this fourth component not only confirms my belief that glycerin isn't necessarily good for me, it also confirms my conclusion that this skin-care product isn't good for me!
#05. Cetyl alcohol is an emulsifying wax; it can be made by turning whale oil (spermaceti) into soap (saponification), by hydrogenating palmitic acid (exposing it to hydrogen), by combining fatty alcohols (alcohol derived from fat) from a variety of vegetable sources or by making it synthetically. Palmitic acid is derived from coconuts or other palms.
The cosmetic industry uses cetyl alcohol as a carrier, an emollient, an emulsifier, a moisturizer, an opacifier and a thickener. Other industries use it in making detergents and drugs.
Please remember that the alcohol you drink is really ethanol; it made by the fermentation of an organic product.
Rubbing alcohol is a drying agent (dessicant).
In its pure form, cetyl alcohol has no hazard rating.
In my book, cetyl alcohol is safe because it is in another product I use with no problems. It appears to me that four fruits I have contact allergies to (almonds, peaches, apricots and cocoa) are not the sources of the fatty alcohols used to make cetyl alcohol.
#06. Glyceryl stearate is made by combining glycerin (see #04 above) and stearic acid.
The Greek word "stea" means "fat", so you know that stearic or stearate must have something to do with fats or oils. Beef tallow is usually the source of stearic acid, but vegetable oils or fats can be used as well.
The cosmetic industry uses glyceryl stearate as an emollient, an emulsifier and as a moisturizer.
In its pure form, safety data makes it clear that you would be better off not swallowing it. It is neither a carcinogen nor a teratogen. It is probably flammable, given the flammability of its components.
I think I'll be avoiding glyceryl stearate in future: If it is based on glycerin (which I know from experience dries my already-dry skin) and fats from unidentified vegetables or fruits to which I might have a contact allergy, I will be better off. Of course, if the product label specifies the derivation of the glycerin and the stearic acid, I could be persuaded to change my mind.
#07. PEG-100 stearate PEG stands for polyethylene glycol (also known as Carbowax, Polywax and Lutrol. PEG-100 stearate is made by combining natural oils with stearic acid (see #06 above) to form a water-soluble ester. It can also be a man-made (synthetic) polymer made by combining oxirane (ethylene oxide) and fatty acids (stearic acid).
The cosmetic industry uses PEG-100 stearate as an emollient, an emulsifier and a moisturizer.
In its pure form, PEG-100 stearate has been included in the USEPA TSCA Inventory and Genetic Toxicology Program (run by the University of California's Public Health Library at Berkeley), which suggests to me that it might be a mutagen. It is neither a carcinogen nor a teratogen. It is as flammable as sesame oil (see #02 above). It is an irritant of eyes, skin and respiratory systems! According to the safety data, it is "slightly toxic by ingestion". Furthermore, the safety data states, "DO NOT INDUCE VOMITING--SEEK MEDICAL HELP OR A POISON CENTER." I wonder how the safety organizations define "very toxic": It seems to me that PEG-100 stearate is very poisonous indeed.
Of the seven chemicals I have looked at so far in my chosen research project, only three are safe for me to use.
There are several more just-as-hazardous components of this no-longer-used-by-me-skin-care product which you can read about in Parts 2 and 3.
Christine Wolfe, Contributing Editor, Suite101.com
(profile: http://www.suite101.com/profile.cfm/Christine_Wolfe)
Article originally printed at http://www.suite101.com/article.cfm/upwards_mobility/102983
