What powerful reasons are there for you to choose a natural moisturiser, and what do mice have to do with it?

There’s powerful reasons to choose a natural moisturiser. Mice need one, for reasons which you’ll find out about soon, but for the same reason humans should also seriously consider using a natural moisturiser rather than so many of the mainstream moisturisers that you see on the shelves of your local store.

If you’ve read our site you will see that we talk extensively about some of the dangerous ingredients found in skin care and anti aging products such as moisturisers. A study published in the Journal of Investigative Dermatology highlighted some of the risks that mice, and you, take when using chemical laden modern moisturisers.

This was a study undertaken to see if caffeine caused cancer in mice. As part of the study a group of mice received 5 applications of moisturiser per day for 17 weeks. Although it was not intended to study this, the researchers found that the application of the moisturising cream to the mice “increased significantly the rate of formation of tumors and the rate of increase in tumor size per mouse”. In other words the use of moisturiser on the skin of mice increased the rate of formation of skin cancer for those mice.
Natural Moisturiser

In fact the use of moisturiser on these mice “increased the total number of histologically characterized tumors by 69%”. 69% is a very significant increase in the risk of skin cancer to those mice. Now of course this refers to mice not people. A 69% increase in the risk of skin cancer in people would be worrying indeed, however that may be the ultimate conclusion to be drawn. Of course this was not studied on people, but the obvious conclusion is still there.

However to understand why natural moisturising is so preferable to using chemical laden mainstream moisturisers you need to know something about the moisturisers that were used as a part of the experiment. You see the moisturisers that were used were Dermabase, Dermovan, Eucerin Original Moisturizing Cream (Eucerin), or Vanicream. And each of these moisturisers contain mineral oil and sodium lauryl sulphate.

We’ve talked about mineral oil in skin care products such as moisturisers on this website before. Mineral oil is a common ingredient in a wide range of personal products such as skin care and anti aging products, cosmetics and much more. It is a petrochemical byproduct and is used in these products because it is incredibly cheap. However there are serious health issues involved in using products on your skin containing mineral oil. Just ask the mice.

We haven’t talked about sodium lauryl sulphate on this website before. You may know about sodium lauryl sulphate because it’s been in the news a lot because it’s found extensively in personal products such as soaps and shampoos and there are also serious health concerns raised from applying products to your skin that contains sodium lauryl sulphate. It’s also in some moisturisers.

Of course the mere fact that moisturisers containing mineral oil and sodium lauryl sulphate, when applied to the skin of mice, can increase the risk of formation of skin cancers by 69% doesn’t prove that the mineral oil and sodium lauryl sulphate caused the skin cancer. However there is one more fact that you should be aware of.

The researchers were so surprised by the unexpected results of the study that they did the study again using a moisturiser that didn’t contain mineral oil or sodium lauryl sulphate. Using this more natural moisturiser they found that there was no increase in the risk of skin cancer to the mice at all.

Now you may be beginning to see why so many people are choosing to use products such as natural face moisturisers and natural anti aging products that don’t contain so many of these chemical ingredients. ANatural Moisturisernd that’s why there are entire organisations such as the Campaign for Safe Cosmetics that have been set up to combat the proliferation of chemical ingredients in our personal products.

The sad fact is that there are many natural ingredients that can be used in natural facial moisturisers which are known to work exceedingly well at both moisturising the skin as well as promoting better overall skin health, but they are very rarely used by the mainstream anti aging companies because they are much more expensive than chemical ingredients like mineral oil and sodium lauryl sulphate.

You may now be getting more interested in natural moisturising after you’ve read about the study, and there’s many many more studies confirming the risks of applying mainstream skin care products to your skin which contain so many chemical and petrochemical ingredients. If you’re interested to find out more then read these pages from the Cosmetic Safety Database. Read more about mineral oil, and about sodium lauryl sulphate.

Products such as avocado oil and macadamia oil can do wonders for your skin, they are excellent natural moisturisers. They are, of course, completely safe and have been eaten for centuries in total safety. And the good news is that there are excellent niche skin care companies that make natural skin care products such as natural moisturisers using ingredients like these which are both safe for your skin and your health and highly effective at better skin care.

One company in particular which makes what we consider to be the worlds best skin care products doesn’t actually make a moisturiser at all. This is because it uses a wide range of natural ingredients in it’s products all of which have excellent properties as natural moisturisers, and therefore all their skin care products moisturise effectively, and there is no need for them to produce a dedicated moisturiser.

Hopefully now that you’ve read about the study you can understand our headline to this story and understand the significance of the mice. Those mice, if they were able to, would be searching for a natural moisturiser just like you should be. Read the rest of this entry

Written by - Natural Skin Health