HeyHazelHazel…Recently I’ve heard that silica powder, like Coastal Scent’s silica powder spheres can cause Silicosis. I thought it was the same thing as Make Up Forever’s HD powder, which is also listed it’s ingredients as 100% mineral silica powder. Are they really the same? Are either of them going to cause Silicosis if I breath them? Both of them float around in the air really easily when you open their jars.
The Right Brain replies:
For those of our readers who aren’t familiar with Silicosis, it’s a lung condition caused crystalline silica is inhaled. This chemical is toxic to the lining of the lung and causes a strong inflammatory response. Over time this inflammation causes the lung tissue to become thickened and scarred. Symptoms of Silicosis include: chronic dry cough, shortness of breath, loss of appetite, trouble sleeping and nails with a bluish tint. But before you start thinking this blog is called the Bronchial Brains, let’s get back to cosmetics.
Mineral Makeup
Fortunately for those of us who love mineral makeup, the kind of silica powder used in cosmetics is not a problem. Hydrated silica (aka silicone dioxide) is a mineral used in many mineral makeup products including Makeup Forever HD and Coastal Scents. This type of silica doesn’t react with lung tissue like the crystalline form does so these products are safe to use. As Forum member Guiness pointed out, additional information on hydrated silica can be found at Cosmeticsinfo.org. So you can stop fuming about your foundation.
The Beauty Brains bottom line
We’re glad we can help clarify the difference between confusing chemicals. There are many kinds of chemicals with similar names and sometimes it takes a chemist to really tell them apart. That’s what we’re here for!
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Thank you for this extremely useful piece of info. I hope you don’t mind, but I’ve linked this to my review on the mufe powder.
Um…hardly an agenda-free source:
http://www.cosmeticsinfo.org/aboutus.php
Cosmeticsinfo.org is an information Web site that includes factual, scientific information on ingredients most commonly used in cosmetics and personal care products in the United States. The Personal Care Products Council (the Council) and its member companies sponsor this Web site to provide consumers with easily accessible comprehensive safety information on cosmetics and personal care products and to help consumers make informed purchases.
I think the confusion arises from the often practiced, yet lazy habit of not referring to chemicals by proper names. Interestingly enough, I was just reading a post on the Chemical and Engineering News (a publication of the American Chemical Society) about this very issue.
I found out about this “silica controversy” yesterday. Of course I have many products that contain silica, but none of them present an inhalation hazard so I dismissed it as a personal issue. Coming across it again on a site that I trust as a fellow chemist has got me thinking about it again. This issue is incredibly confusing for a typical cosmetic user. The Coastal Scents website that you refer to does not accurately portray the differences in “silica” and that information on the Coastal Scents website contains many gaps in knowledge.
Even the post above has a few gaps as well (or maybe I am over-analytical). “Silica” has many forms, and by referring to all of them as silica is confusing. There are crystalline forms, hydrated forms and amorphous forms. Each of these has different properties and as the recent controversy has pointed out, this can be a dangerous practice.
Indeed, by going back to the Coastal Scents site and re-reading it I have also noted that they begin referring to their product as a “silicone”, which in incorrect information. I believe that if instead of listing the ingredient as “100% silica”, the product they sell should be labeled as hydrated silica, full stop. I think this really displays that we cannot run from chemicals, they are all around us and we should begin referring to these chemicals by their proper names.
Sorry for the long comment and thanks for reading.
Another review:
It seems like silica is a stubborn little sucker that sticks to human lung tissues quite well…provided the exposure limit info I’ve posted, and the lack of knowledge on its elimination half life & mechanism, it’s better to stay away from it…yes dusting one’s face every morning for 5mins may seem minute, but the toxic exposure is only 0.1mg-10mg/m3, the volume is only a cube of 1 meter edge, which is likely the volume that we get surround by the powder during application.
I also looked at the MSDS silica sheet from CS, and the exposure level that they’ve listed from OSHA, PEL & TLV (short for permissible, threshhold exposure levels) for a TWA (time weighted average, ~8hrs/day), is 6mg – 10mg/m3, while to cause silicosis via chronic expos. merely req. 0.1mg/m3. Given that little amount of silica in a volume of a cube with 1 meter edges, I would stay away from silica all together, regardless of the brand.
The issue is also the size of the silica sphere..
There is a PROBLEM because of small business online..like Coastal Scents who are not properly regulated or can’t seem to stop relisting their products as fillers and then as a finished product.
Also these companies do not provide enough warning labels or ingredient labels on the actual product. Who is regulating them?
Also have there been actual studies done on the safety of inhaling silica in ANY form? How do we know one form is safe and another not??
Cosmeticsinfo.org is totally biased:
Based in Washington, D.C., the Council is the trade association representing the cosmetic, toiletry and fragrance industry in the United States and globally. Founded in 1894, the Council has a membership of more than 600 companies including manufacturers, distributors, and suppliers of the vast majority of finished personal care products marketed in the United States.
Here is another review from a nonprofit Cosmetics Database.
http://www.cosmeticsdatabase.com/ingredient.php?ingred06=705911&refurl=%2Fproduct.php%3Fprod_id%3D57470%26#pb
@Pavlina. Some of the confusion is because companies are REQUIRED to use the same INCI name for different variations of ingredients!
The INCI for silica microspheres is “silica”. That doesn’t tell you diddly about the size or nature of the silica.
However, OSHA’s warning about silicosis is geared toward miners who are exposed to amounts and extended times we never will be!
ANYTHING can be hazardous to your health. Water can kill you if you drink too much and don’t relieve yourself
I was curious about this issue and as a scientist, I’m very skeptical about what “100% silica” actually means. I too just recently purchased the MUFE HD powder and was really impressed by the results; however I have read that inhalation of silica can lead to silicosis. Since this powder works so well on me, I’ve decided that I would like to continue using this as a powder, however I will try to minimize my exposure to the particles. After reading several articles, I’ve concluded that it’s actually the inhalation of these particles that is toxic and the MUFE powder is a loose powder applied via a brush. That in itself will lead to the silica exposure via inhalation. As such, I’m now searching for silica in pressed powder form. If applied carefully, you should be able to minimize your exposure to the particles since you won’t be using a brush to dust your face, and instead, a sponge to pat your face. I may even wet the sponge slightly and see how that works. I’ve researched some websites and I believe Physicians Formula offers a translucent pressed powder with silica as an ingredient, however it it not the only ingredient so the results may not be the same. The powder has silica listed as its 3rd ingredient (the first is mica). Even so, I’m hoping this switch will be a better choice. To knowingly inhale a carcinogen through its known exposure route, which accumulates in your body and is harmful to your immune system just seems irresponsible to me. You are the only one that will look after you. Not the cosmetics companies that put these products out there.
Hi epidemiologist, we discussed a similar question on this thread http://www.thebeautybrains.com/vanilla/comments.php?DiscussionID=1532&Focus=10030#Comment_10030 What I learned in researching the question of whether mica can cause silicosis is that in order for silicosis to occur, the silica has to be “free” silica. From what the brains explain above, it also has to be a crystalline form of it (like you’d find in quartz dust) to cause silicosis. The bottom line from what I can gather: all compounds containing silicone are not alike in their biological effects.
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