It is startling to note that substandard and fake cosmetic products have flooded the country's markets, including capital Dhaka, metropolitan cities, district towns and even rural areas. As production and import of different products of popular brands have decreased due to the pandemic, the sale and production of counterfeit products have increased drastically. The prevalence of fake cosmetics in the country will lead to serious health problems if the authorities concerned do not take the necessary steps soon.
Health experts are of the opinion that long-term exposure to substandard cosmetic products can potentially cause many diseases, including skin cancer. Counterfeit cosmetics containing mercury can also lead to rashes and skin discoloration.
However, not only the fake cosmetic, cosmetics of many companies also pose serious health hazards as researchers found excessive level of mercury, lead, chromium and cadmium in fairness creams and other cosmetics products available in the market. According to experts human skin absorbs 60 per cent of the chemicals in products that it comes in contact with, and these chemicals move directly into the bloodstream. In this regard, it is worrying to note that most of the cosmetics especially the skin whitening creams available in Bangladesh market contain higher levels of mercury than the level permissible.
People should choose cosmetics with more
caution and try to minimise
their usage
It needs no emphasising that people should choose cosmetics with more caution and try to minimise their usage. The bar code on the company’s packaging should be verified while purchasing any product. Hitherto we do not have any legal arrangement to press the manufacturers to prove the safety of their products. Therefore, authorities concerned should devise regulatory and legislative steps to ensure transparency in producing cosmetics.
Though beauty creams promise to work miracles on the human skin, they too have dark sides to this promise. We still have a wrong phenomenon in our society that associates fairness with beauty. This common desire to be fairer and more beautiful is exploited by few companies who create dazzling advertisements of which allure youngsters to use their fairness products. Pushing the idea that beauty equates with white skin and that it is possible and more preferable, the cosmetic industry is convincing people to buy and use fairness creams. But in Bangladesh most of the users are not aware of the dark side of using beauty creams. Hence, as a responsible and conscious citizen, we must give up our colonial attitude that ‘white is right’.
