Study detects possibly toxic metals in 32 lipsticks

Lipstick can give your lips color, sheen and texture, but may also put you at risk of ingesting potentially toxic metals, University of California, Berkeley researchers say.

The scientists said they found metals in every one of the 32 lipsticks and lip glosses they tested. Some of those substances, including lead, cadmium and chromium, are banned from cosmetics in Europe, but not in the United States.

Previous studies had detected traces of lead in lipstick, but the researchers said theirs was the first to find a variety of other metals that can be toxic in high doses. Manganese, for example, which was found in varying amounts in the tested products, is linked to neurological defects in humans who inhale it on a continuous basis. FDA’s responsibility

Makeup manufacturers in the United States sometimes use metals as color additives. The researchers believe that potentially harmful metals are present in possibly thousands of lip products beyond the 32 they tested.

“The fact that virtually all of them have some metals of some concern leads me to say that it’s a concern in general,” said Katharine Hammond, a UC Berkeley professor and the study’s primary investigator. The report appears in Environmental Health Perspectives.

Hammond declined to disclose the brands tested for the study, saying the information was irrelevant: The data, she said, did not show that certain companies, colors or product types contained disproportionate metal levels.

Consumers should not be burdened with figuring out which products are safe, she argued. Instead, she said, the responsibility belongs to the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, which regulates cosmetics.

“This is where we really need to have some good regulations by the FDA,” she said. The agency did not respond to requests for comment.

For the study, Hammond and her colleagues asked teenage girls to identify lip products they use. The researchers then bought those products — eight lipsticks and 24 lip glosses — at drug and department stores. They broke down the makeup and compared the levels of metal they found with those considered safe for humans to absorb in other forms, such as in air and water.

For example, cadmium — a carcinogen that can lead to kidney and bone impairments when chronically ingested — was detected in nearly half the tested products. A woman who frequently applies heavy amounts of some of those products would be at risk of ingesting more cadmium than is considered safe if she were to be exposed to the same levels in drinking water, researchers said. Loose federal laws

The study found similarly worrisome amounts of manganese and aluminum, which is usually not harmful but can be if it builds up in kidney disease patients, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Protection. Chromium was detected, but it was unclear whether it was the carcinogenic form.

Lead was found in 75 percent of the tested products, confirming previous studies — including a 2009 analysis by the FDA that found lead in all 20 lipsticks it tested.

Hammond found relatively low amounts in her study. But lead, which can cause neurological damage in children, is not considered truly safe at any level, she noted.

The findings add to the public’s knowledge of consumer goods, said Robin Dodson, a research scientist at the Silent Spring Institute, a Massachusetts nonprofit.

Loose federal laws let companies use labels like “green” for contents that are just the opposite, said Joe Guth, a biochemist and legal expert at UC Berkeley.

In Europe, more than 1,000 substances are banned from cosmetics. But the FDA’s cosmetics law is largely the same as when it was passed in 1938, thanks in part to lobbying from the billiondollar cosmetics industry, Guth said.

“Most chemicals that are in cosmetics have never been tested for safety,” he said. “We don’t even know what they are because they don’t have to be put on labels.”

slee@sfchronicle.com