Personal care products

Following up from my earlier post, I'd like to emphasize that sure, a couple ingredients in your shampoo clean your hair. But the rest are toxic dump on your head, ouch! A recent study reveals this:

Findings
In May, 2008, Jane Houlihan c/o the Environmental Working Group reported on the dangers of cosmetics and personal care products, majority are the biggest source of human exposure to dangerous chemicals.

According to her, "companies are free to use almost any ingredient they choose in personal care products, with no proof of safety required." And consumers are not properly warned of possible dangers because of a "lack of standards and labeling loopholes." So, let's just say that the less you hang out with any of these chemicals, the better off you are, we all are.

In addition, Mount Sinai Hospital reports that 2.5 billion pounds of toxins are released in the U.S. annually, the equivalent of 37,100 tanker trucks of noxious chemicals. A lot of these are released from homes daily. Daily, 45 billion gallons of wastewater go down the drain to be treated at one of the 16,000 water treatment plants in the U.S. But wastewater plants are designed to handle ONLY the major pollutants. They can't remove the rest of the chemicals that humans flush every day.

Marketing gimmick at our expense?
There are 2 types of ingredients in shampoo - one type cleans your hair, the other type strokes your emotions. In a typical bottle of the world's most popular shampoos, of the 22 ingredients in this shampoo, only 3 clean hair. The rest are for the psychology of the consumer using the shampoo, put there just to make us feel good. Why do soap manufacturers do that?

Simply because the world spends an estimated $230 billion on beauty products annually. Of this, $40 billion go to shampoo purchases. To get the big share of the lucrative pie, soap manufacturers are more concerend in convincing consumers that their soap adds value to the consumer's life. So they include extra ingredients to make the soap 'perceptually' more "luxurious" or "effective". 

Conclusion
So folks, for the sake of your well-being and your family's, be an informed and ethical consumer. Clean your hair by all means but don't expose your body and our environment to unnecessary risks. Take action today if you must. Write a petition. Long live informed consumers :)

Go here for the full article.