Better living through chemistry?

[ffutures]

Just saw an advert for some skin care stuff made by Olay, and they mentioned that it contains hyleronic acid. My first thought was "they're making that up."

Turns out they aren't, the stuff really exists. There's an apparent causational link between high levels of the stuff in your skin and malignant tumours, so why you would want more of the stuff on your skin is beyond me, but I'm not in the cosmetics business.

Comments

[gonzo21.livejournal.com]

My mum works in a beauty therapist shop, and every now and then brings home samples of the latest high tech magic super cream that miraculously turns back time on your skin. And the list of ingredients in that crap is something else.

[ffutures.livejournal.com]

I suspect that some of it is things I should only handle wearing a lab coat, nitrile gloves, a respirator and safety glasses if they ever turned up at work.

[gonzo21.livejournal.com]

Yeah, if it kills fish and other forms of wildlife, people probably shouldn't be having it injected into their faces.

[beer-good-foamy.livejournal.com]

Any industry that successfully convinces people to inject nerve toxin into their faces can get away with anything, I guess.

[ffutures.livejournal.com]

Pretty much.

[draconin.livejournal.com]

I find the cosmetics industry endlessly bemusing. The ads that say "up to 57% more youthful"... a) how do you measure that, b) "up to" includes zero and actually promises nothing. Then there's Johnsons Baby Oil that proudly proclaims that it "retains 40% more moisture than its competitors*" and when you follow the star you see, in very small print, "when used on wet skin and compared with the competitors used on dry" (paraphrased but the meaning is crystal clear).

[ffutures.livejournal.com]

Haven't seen that one but I can well believe it.

[draconin.livejournal.com]

It's actually even worse than I remembered; it's not 40% it's 1000%!

[ffutures.livejournal.com]

Boggle!

[pauldormer.livejournal.com]

Didn't they use to use lead in cosmetics?

This is my favourite cosmetics ad:

http://www.dailymotion.com/video/x1xy9f_elave-nothing-to-hide_fun#.UbHFoNiwUzI

NSFW

[ffutures.livejournal.com]

Lead, arsenic, you name it and someone has used it in cosmetics.

[eledonecirrhosa.livejournal.com]

I've always been of the opinion that maybe women's skin would look younger and fresher for years longer if they hadn't been plastering it with goop since they hit adolescence!

I wonder if anyone has ever tried to study this... and if they were assassinated by the cosmetics industry! :-)

[ffutures.livejournal.com]

No idea - it wouldn't surprise me.