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Is 'non-toxic' nail polish actually hazardous to your health?

San Jose Mercury News - 10/16/2018

Oct. 16--Beauty is in the eye of the beholder, they say. Never has that phrase seemed truer than when considering the matter of "non-toxic" nail polish brands.

Responding to rising awareness that nail polish often contains potentially hazardous chemicals such as dibutyl phthalate, a plasticizer linked to potential reproductive and developmental problems, toluene, a nervous system and developmental disruptor, and formaldehyde, a carcinogen, many nail polish brands have begun to label themselves as "three-free," "10-free" or even "13-free" meaning that they are free of toxins.

That would be appear to be good news for mavens of mani-pedis. However, a recent study published in the journal of Environmental Science & Technology suggests the world of painted nails may still be a free-for-all because companies often substitute one suspect chemical for another.

"This new evidence raises concern that one toxic chemical (DnBP) has been replaced by another (TPHP)," the report states. "This phenomenon in public health is called regrettable substitution, in which toxic chemicals are replaced with compounds (sometimes of the same chemical class) that are later found to also be toxic."

For the study, Anna Young, a doctoral student at Harvard University, and her team looked at 55 polishes across 44 popular brands sold in stores and nail salons. They compared labels and ingredient lists of the products, checking to see how each one defined being "free" from toxic ingredients. Most of the products labeled 3-free and 5-free were consistent in what was excluded, according to Health. But as the number of "free" ingredients rose, the definitions became inconsistent.

Out of the 10 products labeled "10-free," there were six different variations as to what those 10 toxic compounds were, Health reported. Because there's no standardization across products, there's no way to know if a certain ingredient (like lead or acetone or parabens, for example) is included in a product's list of exclusions.

One substance, a plasticizer and flame retardant known as TPHP, was found in 12 of 27 nail polish samples, notes ABC6, though it was not listed as an ingredient.

"It's sort of like playing a game of chemical Whac-A-Mole, where one toxic chemical is removed and you end up chasing down the next potentially harmful chemical substituted in," Young told Time. ""We found that the meaning of these claims isn't standardized across brands, and there's no clear information on whether these nail polishes are actually less toxic...Sometimes, when one known harmful chemical was removed, the polish instead contained another similar chemical that may be just as toxic."

Concerns over nail polish chemicals has peaked in recent year. U.S. Sen. Kamala Harris, D-Ca, and Nevada Democratic Senator Catherine Cortez Masto recently introduced The Environmental Justice Right to Know Act. If passed, the bill would direct the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health to research ventilation in beauty salons and the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences would be required to report to Congress on the long-term negative health effects of chemicals in beauty products.

Until then, let the buyer beware may be a good rule of thumb.

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