CHRISTINA TAYLOR / Scroll
At least 25 percent of women use 15 cosmetic products daily, earning the cosmetic industry $35 billion annually. Recent studies show that not all ingredients in makeup are as good for the body as they are for looks.

To make up or not – what makes up your makeup

Kadie Sharp SHA04007@BYUI.EDU Lifestyle Asst. Editor

When you apply your makeup every morning, do you ever stop to think what ingredients make up your makeup? According to recent studies, that glob of product may not be as good for your body as it is for your looks.

The cosmetic industry brings in a gain of $35 billion dollars a year, according to the Food and Drug Administration. One quarter of all women and one in every 100 men use at least 15 cosmetic products daily, according to the Environmental Working Group. Society depends on cosmetics such as makeup.

“Since all the girls wear makeup, you feel prettier when you wear it,” said Kristen Knudsen, a freshman from Las Cruces, N.M. “If everyone didn’t wear makeup, then everyone would be considered pretty. If you don’t wear it now, you feel like the ugly duckling.”

As wearing makeup has become more popular, so have makeup studies and research. The EWG from Washington, D.C., has done a study called “Skin Deep” on the dangers of cosmetics.

In this study, the EWG found that out of 14,100 name-brand products, more than one-third contain at least one ingredient linked to causing cancer. There are also chemicals in 57 percent of all the products “that can drive other ingredients faster and deeper into the skin to the blood vessels below,” according to the EWG report.

However, according to the EWG these results are not meant to alarm anyone. There is still more research to be done, but cosmetic consumers should be involved in avoiding known toxic ingredients.

Some of these toxic ingredients listed in “Skin Deep” are lead, which can cause cancer; lead acetate, which can affect human reproduction; and coal tar, which is prohibited by the European Union for its impurities.

All of these ingredients are legal in the United States.

“With the exception of color additives and a few prohibited ingredients, a cosmetic manufacturer may use almost any raw material as a cosmetic ingredient and market the product without an approval from FDA,” according to an FDA report.

According to the EWG, however, the FDA and other “publicly accountable institutions” have evaluated for safety only 11 percent of the 10,500 ingredients used in makeup and other cosmetics.

This doesn’t bother Catherine Pauly, a sophomore from Portland, Ore., who said she doesn’t believe in studies on products.

“I don’t know, [makeup] might affect the health of some people, but it’s never affected me. But pretty much anything can cause bad health,” Pauly said.

Knudsen believes makeup may cause wrinkles in the future, but some products have healthy ingredients, such as sunscreen products in foundations.

“If there was any chance of future health risks, I wouldn’t wear makeup. I’d rather have freckles than breast cancer,” Knudsen said.