Mercury found in skin lightening and anti-aging creams sold online – study | Health

Mercury contamination is widespread among skin lightening and anti-ageing creams sold on online platforms like eBay, Alibaba and Amazon, a new analysis of hundreds of products has been found.

The Zero Mercury Working Group (ZMWG) tested 271 products bought in 15 countries over a 13-month period and found nearly half to be contaminated with the dangerous heavy metal at levels above 1 part per million (ppm), the legal limit in the US . The EU, meanwhile, doesn’t allow any mercury in cosmetics.

“It’s really concerning that these online manufacturers continue to sell and flaunt and profit from illegal products that are doing significant damage to consumers,” said Michael Bender, international coordinator with the Mercury Policy Project.

Mercury is used as a skin whitening agent because it blocks production of melanin, which gives color to skin, and it can be used to remove spots, freckles, blemishes and wrinkles. Some analysts expect skin lightening product sales to reach nearly $12bn globally by 2026, ZMWG said.

Mercury poisoning can cause significant injury, including rashes, kidney disease and nervous system damage. In 2019, a California woman who used mercury-contaminated skin lightening products slipped into a coma

ZMWG, which is an international coalition of more than 110 public health advocacy groups, detected levels as high as 65,000ppm.

“We’re not finding 1ppm – we’re finding products that are hundreds or thousands or tens of thousands of times above [1ppm],” Bender said. “These levels are astronomical.”

Most of the contaminated products were not made by large American or European brands, but were found in Pakistani, Mexican, Chinese and Thai brands that are sometimes popular in those regions.

The most recent analysis builds on three previous rounds of testing by ZMWG. After previous tests, some brands allegedly pulled contaminated batches from shelves, but the most recent study revealed many of the same companies were still selling mercury-contaminated products.

“Seeing the high result is like ‘here we go again’, because it’s the same brands over and over again,” said Elena Lymberidi-Settimo, international co-coordinator with ZMWG. In some cases, the products are simply made in someone’s home, she added ella, so it’s difficult for authorities to find the operation and shut it down.

In a statement to the Guardian, Amazon said it removed the products in question, and it has put “proactive measures in place to prevent suspicious or non-compliant products from being listed”.

The report comes as public health advocates and e-commerce platforms battle over liability. Companies like Amazon have generally claimed that third-party vendors who use its site are responsible for the product’s safety, because Amazon and similar companies merely provide a platform.

The companies are “evading responsibility,” Bender said.

“They knowingly profit from the illegal trade of highly toxic products,” he charged.

That question is playing out in court in California, where a suit against Amazon alleged the company violated the Toxic Enforcement Actor Proposition 65, because it sold skin lightening creams contaminated with mercury.

A lower court sided with Amazon, but the California court of appeals ruled last week that the company must warn consumers when they or their third-party vendors are selling mercury-contaminated products, or other goods with some dangerous toxins.

Bender called it a victory that marked a shift in case law away from shielding e-commerce sites from liability, but he noted the ruling affects only products sold in California when national and global strategies are needed.

“These individual court cases aren’t going to solve these problems,” Bender added.

The US Food and Drug Administration late last year issued an import warning on skin lightening products, but advocates say the agency has limited authority and resources. The Environmental Working Group, which is part of the ZMWG coalition, noted the cosmetics section of the Federal Food, Drug and Cosmetic Act was last updated in 1938, and should be modernized.

Perhaps the most promising development is the Minamata Convention, a recent global treaty in which signatories must ban the manufacture, import or export of cosmetics with more than 1ppm of mercury.

“That’s the gamechanger,” Bender said. “We really need international cooperation.”