Cosmetics containing parabens may be a cause for cancer
A new study has been conducted on skin care products such as lotions, that says parabens in your cosmetics are giving you cancer and you don’t even know it.
Parabens are a preservative used in your everyday cosmetics. This is what makes them last literally years after the package has been opened. Apart from that, parabens mimic the effects of estrogen in the body, which have been linked to an increased danger of developing cancer. This is why the usage of parabens in creams and lotions has always been highly debated.
The team of researchers that conducted this study is housed by the University of California Berkeley and Silent Hill. And they wanted to see exactly what happens when the human body is exposed to parabens. After a series of cellular tests, the results showed that the parabens had actually caused cancer cells to grow in concentration 100 times as opposed to cells that had not been exposed to heregulin, a naturally developed growth factor.
This means that parabens are possibly even stronger than scientists thought, at lower amounts. This is shocking and worrying. The implications here are that even if you use small amounts of skin care products or cosmetics, they are still damaging you, if they contain parabens.
Parabens can be found in all sorts of products, such as lotions, toners, cleansers, mascara, blush, foundation, and the list could go on. Once you’ve opened their package and exposed them to air and the surrounding environment, they can quickly and easily catch dust, micro-organisms, bacteria, molds, fungi, which will all, evidently, be harmful for the skin, eyes or lips.
This is why most of the natural cosmetics have a very, very, short expiry date, perhaps even a month, after which you will actually start to see the mold growing and also why you are advised to store them in the fridge. In the same way, this is why less natural, store brand or mass-market cosmetics have parabens in them. Parabens keep the molds and fungi from ruining your favorite face cream.
But this comes at a price, as the study shows. Increased estrogen levels and developed cancer rate seem like a big price to pay for a brand lipstick. Of course, there are voices that say none of this is true and defend the parabens. They claim studies have also been made and that their results were in favor of using them. However this may be, you know you cannot go wrong with natural!
Image Source: www.wikimedia.org