Tag Archives: formaldehyde beauty products

Dangerous Beauty Part 2: Why you don’t want to be anywhere near the formaldehyde in a Brazilian Blowout

The formaldehyde in Brazilian Blowout products is dangerous for both stylists and their clients.

Today’s post comes to us from our colleague Charlie Domer of Wisconsin.

This is the second installment in our series on the dangers of hair-straightening products with formaldehyde.

For many of us, the word formaldehyde conjures up images of high school biology class, and glass jars full of preserved frogs. But for Molly Scrutton, a stylist from Portland, Oregan, it most likely calls to mind the sore throat and aching chest she felt after giving her clients the Brazilian Blowout hair treatment.

After investigating and learning that other stylists had suffered from similar symptoms, Scrutton reported it to local health officials. Since then, Brazilian Blowout has been found to contain over 10 times the amount of formaldehyde considered safe.

Turns out formaldehyde is pretty nasty stuff. Here’s why:

Formaldehyde does terrible things to the body.

Formaldehyde can irritate the eyes and nose, causing coughing and wheezing. It can cause allergic reactions of the skin, eyes and lungs, such as asthma-like breathing problems, skin rashes, and itching. Effects reported by users of formaldehyde-laced hair straightening products include eye disorders, nervous system disorders, respiratory tract problems, chest pain, vomiting and rash. If you have been exposed to a hair straightener and suffer from any of these symptoms, you should seek medical treatment immediately.

Sometimes the effects of formaldehyde exposure are irreversible or fatal.

When formaldehyde is sprayed into the eyes, it can cause blindness. It is also a known carcinogen, and has Continue reading

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Dangerous Beauty: FDA says Brazilian Blowout lied about the deadly formaldehyde in their product

Today’s post comes to us from our colleague Charlie Domer of Wisconsin.

It all started a little over a year ago, when an Oregon hair stylist reported difficulty breathing, nosebleeds, and eye irritation after using the popular Brazilian Blowout hair-straightening product on her customers. Based on her referral, Oregon’s Occupational Safety and Health Division, and eventually the national Occupational Safety & Health Administration (OSHA) began testing hundreds of hair straightening products. They found formaldehyde, an irritating and carcinogenic substance, in many of them. In particular, the product called Brazilian Blowout, which is falsely labeled as formaldehyde-free, was found to contain dangerous amounts of the substance.

They found formaldehyde, an irritating and carcinogenic substance, in many of the products.

Well, now the FDA has also issued a warning letter to the makers of Brazilian Blowout saying that the levels of formaldehyde in their product are extremely high. In the FDA’s tests, levels of formaldehyde in samples ranged from 8.7% to 10.4 %, more than 10 times higher than the 0.2% that is considered safe. Brazilian Blowout’s chief executive Mike Brady says he Continue reading

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