Fragrance chemicals harm human health – consumer should know about them

https://hej-support.org/fragrance-chemicals-harm-human-health-consumer-s...

We all are consumers and we all have the right to know if toxic chemicals  are  hiding  in  products we purchase, including the  beauty  and  personal  care  products we  use  every  day.  However a policy labeling loophole allows manufacturers to hide unlabeled, unregulated toxic fragrance ingredients in the products they sell.

Dozens sometimes even hundreds of chemicals can hide in beauty and personal care products that contain fragrance. Many of these fragrance chemicals are linked to harm to human health.

We all have a right to expect that the beauty and personal care products we buy are safe. Ingredients linked to cancer, hormone disruption, and reproductive harm must be labeled so that consumers can make informed buying decisions.

However, the vast and growing $70 billion global fragrance industry is entirely unregulated. No national law checks the safety of fragrance chemicals or requires labeling of fragrance ingredients for consumers or even disclosure to regulatory agencies.

Breast Cancer Prevention Partners’ newest report Right to Know: Exposing Toxic Fragrance Chemicals in Beauty, Personal Care and Cleaning Products documents the extent of this widespread problem.

Among the report’s most shocking findings:

• The most hazardous product of all was a children’s shampoo called “Just for Me”,marketed to kids of color in a hair relaxing kit. This  product  contained  24  chemicals  linked  to   chronic  health  effects.  Most  of  the  24  were  fragrance  chemicals  that did  not  appear  on  the  label.
• Fragrance  chemicals  made  up 3/4  of  the  toxic  chemicals  in  the  beauty  and  personal  care  products tested.
• Several  of  the  products  that  had  the  most  hazardous  chemicals  were  fine  fragrances  endorsed  by  popular  celebrities.

Many  personal  care  products  tested  contained  more  hazardous  chemicals  than  the  cleaning  products  tested!

HEJSuport joins Breast Cancer Prevention Partners and many more environmental and health organizations worldwide and calls  for  full  fragrance  ingredient  disclosure so  consumers  can  make  safer,  more  informed  purchases.   

We  feel  confident  the  report  Right to Know: Exposing Toxic Fragrance Chemicals in Beauty, Personal Care and Cleaning Products will  help  us all  make  the  case  for  mandated  fragrance  ingredient  disclosure  and  stricter  regulation  of  the  fragrance  industry worldwide.