Congratulations to the great team at Campaign for Safe Cosmetics for getting Johnson & Johnson to commit to removing carcinogens from its baby products. As America’s most trusted brand (according to a recent Forbes survey), J&J owes it to its customers to do the best job it can to make the safest products possible.

The company made a significant step forward today with its pledge to reformulate hundreds of baby products worldwide to remove formaldehyde and 1,4 dioxane. That’s where all baby brands need to be: getting chemicals known to cause cancer in animals out of products used on babies’ bodies.

Many groups and people were involved in this victory — members of the Campaign for Safe Cosmetics and dozens of ally groups, particularly American Nurses Association — but I want to give a special shout out to a special someone who was instrumental in making this happen, our fearless campaign leader Lisa Archer. Lisa just got home from the hospital with her new baby girl. Welcome to the world Sylvie Linnea Ethier; this one’s for you!

Here’s some great press coverage in Associated Press and Washington Post.

Important links:
March 2009 report “No More Toxic Tub” reveals carcinogens in many baby products
May 2009 letter to Johnson & Johnson from Campaign and allies
Sept. 2009 letter to J&J about its use of quaternium-15
Oct. 31, 2011 letter to J&J about new report “Baby’s Tub is Still Toxic”
Nov. 16, 2011 J&J letter pledging reformulation

I’m glad to see the mainstream media finally giving some attention to the question of whether all these pink ribbons are actually helping the breast cancer cause. The New York Times gave serious ink space to the issue, although largely missed the point, with “The Pinking of America” by Natasha Singer last month. And Friday, Forbes posted this comprehensive piece by Amy Westervelt, “The Pinkwashing Debate: Empty Criticism or Serious Liability?”

Serious liability, I say! (and thanks to Amy for quoting me in the story). As I wrote in the comments, I was dismayed to read that Elizabeth Thompson, president of Susan G. Komen for the Cure, thinks environmental links to cancer are based not on evidence but on “beliefs and emotion.” Ms. Thompson should take a look at the 2007 study commissioned by her own organization with the Silent Spring Institute, which identified 216 chemicals that cause breast cancer in animals that are widely detected in human tissues and in environments, like the home, where women spend time.

Because exposure to these chemicals is so widespread, “the public health impacts of reducing exposure would be profound even if the true relative risks are modest,” the researchers wrote. “If even a small percentage is due to preventable environmental factors, modifying these factors would spare thousands of women.”

I would also suggest Ms. Thompson take a look at the President’s Cancer Panel report of 2010, which states that the “true burden of environmentally induced cancer has been grossly underestimated” and calls for immediate action to reduce carcinogens in the environment.  Also on the reading list should be the Breast Cancer Fund’s State of the Evidence report, which documents hundreds of studies linking chemical exposures and radiation to increased breast cancer risk.

Unfortunately, the big breast cancer charities seem to have taken on the mentality of the corporations that fund them — growth for the sake of growth, whatever it takes. The original intent of the pink ribbon as an advocacy tool has long been  buried in an avalanche of marketing hype to sell products and goodwill for corporations that are contributing to the problem by selling unhealthy products and/or putting carcinogens into the environment and our bodies.

What do you think? Is there no such thing as too much pink (as Nancy Brinker told the NYT)? Or is it time to pressure Susan G. Komen for the Cure and other big cancer charities to stop partnering with corporations that are part of the problem and start talking seriously about prevention?

I’d love to hear your comments…

More must-read coverage:
Sacramento Bee: “Pink Inc. Has Many Starting to See Red,” by Francesca Lyman
Nancy Brinker’s response: “Too Much Pink? Not while breast cancer still kills”
Marie Claire: “The Big Business of Breast Cancer” by Lea Goldman
Forbes: “Pinkwashing: Corporate Sponsored Cancer,” by Mia Davis, Amy Lubitow
Deseret News: “Are all the pink ribbons helping to cure cancer?” by Sarah Gamble

Three cheers to Margot Boyd for sending this poignant letter to Dove and for your commitment to safe cosmetics. Check out Dove’s response below: It’s legal therefore it’s safe. If we only had a dollar for every time we heard that one…

Hello Dove,

Today I discovered at my front door: a Dove advertisement, coupon and a sample of your “nutritive therapy” product that I never requested. A quick check of the ingredients reveals your product contains a litany of toxic substances. To name but a few: 1) Dimethicone, which has been shown to cause tumors and mutations in experimental work with animals; 2) Disodium EDTA, a penetration enhancer that can draw other chemicals into the bloodstream; 3) Petrolatum, a petrochemical that is often contaminated with two well-known carcinogens Benzo-A-Pyrene and Benzo-B-Fluroanthene; and 4) Methylisothiazolinone, a suspected neurotoxin and a known human immune system toxicant.

I do not allow Dove products in my home. I would not use them on my body, or allow my husband/children to use them. I would not rinse your products down the sink for the aquatic life in Lake Ontario to have to deal with. (Nor do I relish the thought of drinking it in our tap water afterwards…) I will not contribute to the Pink Ribbon campaign due to your participation in it. I am appalled by your seductive advertising to women whom I feel are unsuspecting.

So now to properly dispose of the ‘hazardous waste’ you have left at my door, I will have to take it to the proper City drop off depot. The damage and costs you cause people and the environment are not insubstantial. I would appreciate you picking up your parcel and properly disposing of it according to the City of Toronto hazardous waste materials – which is where your ingredients officially belong.

Yours sincerely,
Margot Boyd

Three cheers to Rep. Jan Schakowsky, Rep. Ed Markey and Rep. Tammy Baldwin for championing women’s health, children’s health and sustainable businesses by introducing the Safe Cosmetics Act of 2011 today! We love this bill and here’s why it has the full support of the environmental health community:

Current cosmetics laws are 70 years old and failing to protect public health. Under the current law from 1938, manufacturers are allowed to put known carcinogens and other harmful chemicals into personal care products with no required safety assessments. What’s the result of this antiquated system? People are getting sick. For a personal story about why this bill is so important, check out this blog post from a hairstylist who is ill from formaldehyde poisoning.

Other countries are far ahead of the US when it comes to cosmetics safety. Just look at the Brazilian Blowout scandal. This supposedly “formaldehyde free” hair product was found to contain high levels of formaldehyde, a known carcinogen that causes asthma and other severe effects as described in the hairstylist’s blog. This product is banned in other countries and federal OSHA has warned salons to stop using it due to cancer risk. Yet the FDA has done nothing and  these unsafe hair products are still being used in salons across America.

Even baby products contain formaldehyde and other carcinogens. Brazilian Blowout is just the tip of the iceberg: Many body-care products, even iconic baby brands Johnson’s Baby Shampoo and Sesame Street Bubble Bath, contain carcinogens like formaldehyde and 1,4 dioxane. These chemicals often aren’t listed on labels due to loopholes in the law. The Safe Cosmetics Act will fix this problem and ensure our right to know what’s in the products we put on our bodies.

The Safe Cosmetics Act is good for businesses as well as consumers. In case the cosmetics industry hasn’t noticed, sustainable businesses are the fastest growing segment of their industry. Consumers want safe products. Companies will only gain by phasing out harmful chemicals and innovating safer alternatives.  The Safe Cosmetics Act also includes important provisions for data sharing and supplier disclosure that will provide businesses and consumers with the information they need to make the best choices.

The Safe Cosmetics Act works especially for small businesses. There was some uproar in the small business community about last year’s version of the bill. The bill sponsors worked hard to address those concerns and ensure the new bill is workable and helpful for small businesses. Here’s a great piece from Rebecca Hamilton, co-owner of Badger, about the Five Reasons Why the Safe Cosmetics Act Makes Sense for Small Businesses. Kudos to Rebecca and Badger for stepping forward with a strong voice to support this bill.

As Fran Drescher has said, “This is a non partisan issue, this is a human issue.”  (Check out Fran’s great piece today in The Hill!). The Safe Cosmetics Act is not about Democrats or Republicans, it’s about women wanting to protect their families and have control over the products they bring into their homes and put on their bodies. Everyone is affected by cancer, infertility, learning disabilities and other serious health impacts linked to chemicals in our environment and in our everyday products like cosmetics. And everyone — women, men, babies, businesses and the politicians too — have a lot to gain by legislation that protects our health and spurs the innovation of safer, healthier products.

So let the games begin! We need YOU to help pass the Safe Cosmetics Act, so please take action here — and let’s get some common-sense legislation moving through the US Congress!

From Stacy Malkan, Lisa Archer, Janet Nudelman, Mia Davis and all of us at the Campaign for Safe Cosmetics.

The Campaign for Safe Cosmetics is a coalition of more than 150 nonprofit organizations working to protect the health of consumers and workers by eliminating dangerous chemicals from cosmetics. Core members include: Clean Water Action, the Breast Cancer Fund, Commonweal, Environmental Working Group, Friends of the Earth, Massachusetts Breast Cancer Coalition and Women’s Voices for the Earth.

I’ll get straight to the good part: What’s the deal with the lady from L’Oreal? Many of you asked me this after I tweeted: “L’Oreal rep is reportedly ‘very upset’ about my presentation.” So here’s what I can tell you about that story.

Just as I was about to get on stage to give my keynote speech at the NY Sustainable Cosmetics Summit, I was approached by the conference organizer. He had come to warn me that a woman from L’Oreal was “very upset” about the remarks I was about to give. She was insisting on a rebuttal and she had been calling and sending faxes to the Personal Care Products Council,  demanding that they get down to the Marriott right away to defend the industry (the trade association never did show up at the Summit, sustainability apparently not being one of their chief concerns).

The L’Oreal lady hadn’t actually heard my remarks, since I hadn’t given them yet, but she was triggered by two of my slides published in the conference manual:

“Lack of Safety Data” pointed out that 90% of chemicals on the market have no human health data and less than 20% of cosmetic ingredients have been assessed by the industry’s safety panel (I’m upset about that too!); my other slide described efforts to reform federal cosmetics regulations via the Safe Cosmetics Act.

Amarjit suggested I could omit the offending slides, to which I replied hell no, and pointed out that a little controversy is a good thing for this type of conference, which provides an imp