I am annoyed again. Annoyed because NRK once more has highlighted something completely USELESS, and which ruins a lot of peoples perception of the cosmetic industry. Let me first just get one thing straight. I don't mind that programs, TV-channels, Magazines or newspapers write about what we all do. I don't mind focus on important issues, or critique of things that might be dangerous. But here's the thing. When these things are taken out of context, and blow up to HUGE proportions.. Without it being fair at all -that's when I mind.
The other day NRK had another show focusing on "dangerous" substances in regular household items -meaning cosmetics/deodorants etc. They features pictures of a lot of our products, but also products at the food stores. The claim is that 40% of the products on the norwegian marked contain these "hormone disruptive substances".
I've written about this before, albeit in Norwegian. My conclusion to the question about parabens: They are not dangerous to humans, and have not been proven to have any hormone inducing or hormon disruptant effects in human beings. They are more likely to be out-compeeted (norwegian direct translation going on here) by normal estrogen in women, and probably also in men as estrogen is far more potent to trigger the receptors.The studies that I reffered to are using HIGH dosages, resulting in up towards having 75% of your skincarelotion packed with butylparabens. Imagine that.
The parabens that are used on the Norwegian marked is methyl-, ethyl-, propyl- and butylparaben. The allowed is 0,4%, and that is combined if you use combinations of the above mentioned. It is the most used preservative, and compared to a lot of others (preservatives) they are allowed all over the world. Parabens are one of the few preservatives that we know about that cause little allergies in regular persons. There are no studies to prove that it gives you cancer, and it is proven that if they penetrate the body they will be broken down and excreted.
What is also important to think about is that it isn't just parabens in cosmetics, there are also plenty of parabens in your food that you eat every day. The goverment, and the EU are focusing far more on those concentrations and effects than that of the skin care products. The amount that penetrates your skin is different compared to what you eat and digest, not that I have read anything on this.
Back to my point.. Yesterday a woman walked in to my pharmacy and said the following "I don't want a cream with anything toxic/poisionous in it". First of all, what do you mean by toxic, second -what the HELL? POISIONOUS? Do you think we sell stuff in a damn PHARMACY that will 1. kill you or 2. make you sick? Of course, a lot of things can make you sick, and yes, we do sell a bunch of weird shit, but WHAT THE HELL? The bad part about this was that one of our suppliers cream was unfairly put in the paraben category, when it clearly has none.
My biggest issue again is, what the hell about all these NEW things that we put in stuff to preserve it? Do we know anything about these? Adverse reactions, long term effects...
WHY oh WHY NRK do you have to make everything super suspicious and horrible, and give people the wrong impression. We all know that things on NRK HAS to be a fact/true. With me you guys lost a lot of points...
Kudos for focusing on stuff, Non-kudos for fucking it up
XoXo
M
