Uncommon Beauty Sites

If you think buying personal care products on the recommendation of a doctor or in a natural health store are safe, you may have another think coming. I certainly did. Several years ago, my dermatologist recommended I use Cetaphil to cleanse my face. I had no idea it was an 8.8 (out of 10) on the Richter Scale of Health concern until I read
�The Ugly Side of Pretty� by Rebecca Ephraim, R.D., C.C.N. in Common Ground, the (San Francisco) bay area magazine for conscious community. She recommended pulling a custom report of the products you use from Skin Deep’s interactive website www.ewg.org/resports/skindeep, which rates toothpastes, deodorants, hair products, and more by areas of health concern. It’s eye opening to say the least, and makes one wonder about the cumulative effects of so many mysterious components. According to the article, “emerging science suggests that untold numbers of cosmetics and personal care ingredients may be silently and insidiously, promoting cancer, ravaging women’s reproductive functions and causing birth defects. Known by hundreds of long, intimidating chemical names, these ingredients are in the products we show and bathe with, rub, spray and dab on our bodies, unconsciously day in and day out.�
Europeans are actively doing something about it, requiring companies to eliminate chemicals in personal care products known or strongly suspected of causing “harm to human health�. There’s a petition to get US companies to do same. Go to www.safecosmetics.org. Other sites listed in Ms. Ephraim’s report www.avalonnaturalproducts.com , www.breastcancerfund.org, www.commonweal.org.
Evidently, we have more power than we know as consumers. We need to exercise it.