Allergy Trigger Used in Personal Care Products

It’s so sad what these big manufacturers are allowed to put in their products. It’s actually very scary.

I just came across this article in the New York Times and it is something that I hope everyone reads and shares.

Because she has an eczema condition, Michelle Kirn intently reads ingredient labels on baby wipes, soaps and other household items to avoid allergic reactions that she says were caused by a commonly used preservative.

Ms. Kirn, 37, says she believes that nerve damage and scarring to her hands stemmed from using wipes that contained the preservative methylisothiazolinone.

Still, when her throat began to swell, she says she did not think to check the label of her new mouthwash, Colgate Total Lasting White.

“I thought I was developing allergies to foods,” Ms. Kirn, a consultant in Breinigsville, Pa., said. “I felt like I constantly had a sore throat.”

Colgate-Palmolive introduced that product in August, and it may be the only popular mouthwash to contain methylisothiazolinone (MI), an ingredient added to deter the growth of bacteria. But it can cause rashes and skin irritations in people who are allergic to it. The company chose that preservative, according to Stephanie Clark, a spokeswoman for Colgate, because it worked best for that particular formula.

The dermatitis society named MI its “allergen of the year” in 2013, a listing intended to give attention to problematic and often obscure substances. That same year, the Scientific Committee on Consumer Safety, a European advisory group, said that MI should be used only in limited quantities for rinse-off products, like soaps and shampoos, and that “no safe concentrations” existed for leave-on products like lotions.

You can read the entire article here.

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