Parabens are cheap and extremely effective preservatives that are found in cosmetics, food, pharmaceutical products etc and that can enter the human body through ingestion or skin adsorption. They can be detected in urine, blood and breast milk. Increasingly, there is evidence that parabens are associated with breast cancer and allergy developments.
This blog’s policy is to not suggest/recommend products that contain parabens, oxybenzone and BHT. You can read more about parabens by clicking on this link.
However, I also believe in not inflicting my lifestyle choices on you…
Study: “Methylparaben exposure triggers childhood overweight development“
No fewer than 21 scientists in Germany conducted and reported on the aforementioned study. Evidently, they disavowed the English language, but their mandate was to “investigate the effect of prenatal paraben(s) exposure on childhood overweight (or obesity?) by combining epidemiological data from a mother-child cohort (or group) with experimental approaches (involving mice).”
They performed their experiment on mice and found that maternal butylparaben exposure on mice increased food intake and weight gain in female offspring. They also found that there was a silencing/or reduction in the expression of POMC*, which is known to be involved in appetite regulation.
Basically female offspring felt less full and therefore ate more resulting in weight gain.
So they experimented in mice and established a “hypothesis driven mechanistic studies in humans and mouse in in vitro models.” They looked at the urine sample of their pregnant women cohort and found that 3 times more parabens (methyl-, propyl- etc) were found in their urine samples then those pregnant women that didn’t use paraben containing leave on products. Then through some more theorising they linked the mice study outcome to what could happen in humans, concludint that “paraben exposure could trigger childhood obesity.”
What do I think?
My twopence is a bunch of non-cosmetic industry funded scientists performed an experiment that may link parabens to obesity in girls. In their view, the current obesity epidemic cannot be linked to just eating more…there is something else in play and the silencing of POMC, that’s responsible for satiety fits into this hypothesis. Over the next year or so, I completely expect 40 million other scientists to rubbish this report. But I am going to watch this space and I’ll keep you updated.
Notes: *Pro-opiomelanocortin (POMC) enhancer 1
See Dazid Suzuki’s dirty dozen chemicals
Sources and uses:
Dabre, P.D. et al. Concentrations of parabens in human breast tumours. J. Appl. Toxicol. 24, 5-13, (2004), Yim, E., Baquerizo Nole, K.L. & Tosti, A. Contact dermatitis caused by preservatives. Dermatitis 25, 215-313 (2014)