Lipsticks

General information

Lipsticks contain waxes, oils, emollients, antioxidants, and pigments [ ]. Common ingredients include beeswax, ozokerite, candelilla wax or Carnauba wax; olive oil, mineral oil, cocoa butter, petrolatum, lanolin, or castor oil. Palmitate-related substances and branched-chain fatty acid esters, such as glyceryl di-isostearate and di-isostearyl malate, have replaced lanolin and castor oil as major components.

Lipsticks often contain lead in small amounts. In 26 different brands of lipsticks the median (IQ range) lead content was 0.73 (0.49–1.79) ppm wet weight [ ]. Four brands had lead contents above the FDA limit set for impurities in color additives (20 ppm). Of 400 lipsticks available on the US market in 2010, the average lead content was 1.11 mg/kg and the maximum was 7.19 mg/kg; in 13 cases the content was greater than 3.06 mg/kg [ ]. Similar results were found in a Turkish study of 25 lipsticks (0.11–4.48 mg/kg) [ ]. These results suggest that lead in most lipsticks probably has no significant toxicological effects.