06/08/2025
Fragrance secrecy is legal due to a giant loophole in the Federal Fair Packaging and Labeling Act of 1973, which requires companies to list cosmetics ingredients on the product labels but explicitly exempts fragrance.
The government is equally uninformed. A review of government records shows that the U.S. Food and Drug Administration has not assessed the vast majority of these secret fragrance chemicals for safety when used in spray-on personal care products.
To make matters worse, FDA lacks the authority to require manufacturers to test cosmetics for safety, including fragranced products, before they are sold to consumers.
Why the secrecy and why are they untouchable?
Laboratory tests commissioned by the Campaign for Safe Cosmetics and analyzed by Environmental Working Group revealed 38 secret chemicals in 17 name brand fragrance products with the average fragrance product tested contained 14 secret chemicals not listed on the label. Among them are chemicals associated with hormone disruption, reproductive toxicity and a propensity to accumulate in human tissues
For instance, Galaxolide and Tonalide, two synthetic musks, can be detected in the cord blood of newborn babies (EWG 2009). Both musks contaminate people and the environment worldwide, have been associated with toxicity to the endocrine system (van der Burg 2008) and were identified in the majority of products tested.
Similarly, a pregnant woman’s use of some fragrances and other cosmetics frequently may expose her growing fetus to diethyl phthalate (DEP), a common perfume solvent linked to abnormal development of reproductive organs in baby boys and s***m damage in adult men (Washington Toxics Coalition 2009).
New research also links prenatal exposure of DEP to clinically diagnosed Attention Deficit Disorder in children (Engel 2010). This analysis found DEP in 12 of 17 products tested, at levels ranging from 30 parts per million (ppm) to 32,000 ppm in Eternity for Women.
EWG summary article and Link to the full PDF:
https://www.ewg.org/research/not-so-sexy Not So Sexy | Environmental Working Group
See movie Stink that was pulled from Netflix:
https://youtu.be/Gxd-o4WZtrI?si=PFtCPaB3nvj8hD0K
Also: SAFE COSMETICS :
https://www.safecosmetics.org/e
Laboratory tests commissioned by the Campaign for Safe Cosmetics and analyzed by EWG revealed 38 secret chemicals in 17 name brand fragrance products, topped by American Eagle Seventy Seven with 24, Chanel Coco with 18, and Britney Spears Curious and Giorgio Armani Acqua Di Gio with 17.
