Organic Shaving Cream

We all agree on that fact that there are very few things in life that matter more than health. If you are not healthy, you don’t have the energy to do whatever else matters in life – or you at least have less energy than you would otherwise have.

Now what has this to do with shaving cream? Stay with me for a moment.

If you’re old enough, you might remember DDT. DDT was a chemical pestizide that got very popular in the 50’s and from then on farmers everywhere started using it to fight insects that could harm their harvest.

But then, in 1962 a book came out called “Silent Spring” – and it pointed out some of DDTs not so pleasant properties. This led to more research being done and finally in 1973 DDT got banned in the US (and most other parts of the world).

Why did such an effective pesticide got banned?

Not only did DDT have severe effects on the environment, but specially on human health. It’s pretty safe to say the scientific research has shown that DDT can be linked to causing several kinds of cancers (including cancer of the liver, breast cancer, cancer of the biliary tract, pancreatic cancer, testicular cancer, prostate cancer and others). There are many other diseases that can be linked to DDT, but I think there is no need to list them all here – the point is, DDT is not good for you and can make you sick. Good thing it’s banned in the USA.

Another chemical – less popular than DDT and you might not have heard about it – is called DEA. DEA stands for diethanolamine.

DEA is not banned in the USA. And DEA can be found in most shaving creams. Maybe it’s listed as TEA (triethanolamine), which often contains certain amounts of DEA.

Now why am I telling you this?

Let’s look at a scientific study from 1999 from the National Toxicology Program. This study (you can read it online here, but it’s quiet a long read, 200+ pages).

I just want to quote some paragraphs from their report here:

“There was clear evidence of carcinogenic activity of diethanol-amine in male and female B6C3F mice based on increased incidences of liver neoplasms in males and females and increased incidences of renal tubule neoplasms in males. Dermal administration of diethanolamine to rats was associated with increased incidences of acanthosis (males only), hyperkeratosis, and exudate of the skin and increased incidences and severities of nephropathy in females. Dermal administration of diethanolamine to mice was associated with increased incidences of cytoplasmic alteration (males only) and syncytial alteration of the liver, renal tubule hyperplasia (males only), thyroid gland follicular cell hyperplasia, and hyperkeratosis of the skin.”

So, let’s look at that again:

• carcinogenic activity
• liver neoplasms
• renal tubule neoplasms
• acanthosis
• hyperkeratosis
• exudate of the skin
• nephropathy
• cytoplasmic alteration
• syncytial alteration of the liver
• renal tubule hyperplasia
• thyroid gland follicular cell hyperplasia
• hyperkeratosis of the skin

These were some of the oberserved results after they exposed rats’ skin to DEA. (remember, they didn’t FEED the rats with DEA – they just put DEA on the skin – and that’s exactly what you do when you put on shaving cream, right? You put it on the skin…)

But you can say, yes, rats are not humans, what kills a rat doesn’t kill me (like rat poison, right? uhm… right?). And yes, the amounts of DEA applied were excessive, and people can die from drinking water if they drink too much, right? (If that’s the way you’re thinking, I hope you don’t think that way about heroin too…)

Ok, ok, but if you say: well, that DEA isn’t enough to scare off a big man like me, that’s fine, I can accept that.

Let’s for a moment assume that DEA indeed does no harm and look at that shaving cream of yours again.

When that shaving cream is being transported in the truck to the store, and then it’s sitting on that shelf, and then you buy it and bring it home, some time has passed from the day it got filled into cans (or tubes) until you put in on your face.

In this time, in the inside of that shaving cream something interesting could have happened. The DEA could have reacted with other ingredients of the shaving cream and turned into NDEA. If adding an extra letter doesn’t scare you off, let me tell you that NDEA stands for nitrosodiethanolamine. And one of the characteristics of NDEA is that your body absorbs it through the skin quiet easily and willingly. Another characteristic is that it can be linked to stomach cancer. And bladder cancer. And liver cancer. And esophagus cancer.

The International Agency for Research on Cancer recommends that NDEA should be treated as if it would be causing cancer (because there are strong scientific indicators that point toward that conclusion). So, if the International Agency for Research on Cancer recommends that, why isn’t it happening?

Well, in fact the FDA (Food and Drug Administration) ordered the cosmetics industry in 1979 to make sure that no more NDEA is in their products.

But the thing is that while the FDA is indeed a very powerful institution, it is not at all that powerful in the cosmetics industry. Because the cosmetics indstury is the least regulated industry under the jurisdiction of the FDA. Basically they can make recommendations, but they can’t do much else. The FDA could play it’s role in stopping the use of DDT, because this was *food* (like in FOOD and Drug Administration). The FDA also proves very powerful when it comes to drug – if there is enough scientific evidence to prove that a certain drug causes cancer or another threatening disease, it gets pulled of the market very fast. But not with cosmetics (after all, remember, it’s not the FDCA – “Food, Drug and Cosmetics Administration…). And even with DDT it took 11 years after the book had been published (which already contained lots of done research) until the ban got effective.

Now, instead of being upset about the lack of regulation for the costmetics industry, there is two things you can do right away – actually three:

1. Hit them where it hurts them: in their pocket. Stop buying their shaving creams.
2. Be on the safe side: buy organic shaving cream. Organic shaving cream has natural ingredients and you won’t be exposed to NDEA there.
3. Sign the petition to ban DEA