FDA warns of skin creams, lotions tainted with mercury (ABC7-TV San Francisco, 5/16/2012)
Mercury in imported skin-lightening creams is just the latest example of toxic chemicals in cosmetics.
Stacy Malkan
How safe are cosmetics? New bill wants to find out (AOL News, 7/21/2010)
“Most people assume the FDA regulates cosmetics the same way it does food and drugs to ensure they are safe. In reality, cosmetics are one of the least-regulated consumer products on the market today.”
The ugly side of beauty, some cosmetics can be toxic (Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, 7/20/2010)
“Much like the tobacco industry, which denied for years the mounting body of evidence that smoking caused cancer and emphysema, the global $300 billion cosmetics industry argues that toxic ingredients are absorbed in such small amounts they have no dangerous effect.”
Study: Chemicals, pollutants found in newborns (San Francisco Chronicle, 12/3/09)
Besides BPA, umbilical cord blood of American infants may be contaminated with synthetic musks. These musks are chemicals commonly used in “fragrance,” that mystery ingredient in shampoo, lotion, spray cleaner and, yes, perfume.