No time to read labels? Seven websites to help you find personal care products without harmful chemicals and learn more about ingredients.

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More than 12,000 chemicals are approved for use in the US cosmetics and personal care industry today. Consumer health advocates and some researchers have for years warned that some of those are unsafe. For example, more than 200 possible endocrine-disrupting chemicals currently in use in cosmetics and personal care products have been identified by The Endocrine Disruption Exchange. In our previous post, we listed chemicals that are used as preservatives and can release formaldehyde, a known human carcinogen.

It is virtually impossible to remember all potentially harmful ingredients when shopping for baby and adult personal care products. Fortunately for health-conscious people, there are several organizations dedicated to evaluating safety concerns associated with chemicals used in these products. Here is a list of websites to help you find clean personal care and cosmetic products.

  1. The Environmental Working Group (EWG). The EWG VERIFIED™ mark means that the product meets EWG’s strictest standards for health and safety. It avoids any of the ingredients on EWG’s “Unacceptable List” and provides full transparency of ingredients, including fragrance. You can also search for verified baby and adult personal care products on their website.
  2. CosDNA. Here you can search for personal care and cosmetic products by name, ingredient, and barcode and see a safety rating of each ingredient used in the product.
  3. Credo www.credobeauty.com. Credo is a marketplace that bans products that contain ingredients, which are linked to health or environmental issues.
  4. The Detox Market. The Detox Market only sells clean beauty products that have been vetted by their team of experts.
  5. CosIng, the European Commission database for information on cosmetic substances and ingredients contained in the cosmetics. CosIng is the official online database for cosmetics ingredients in the EU. It provides information about potential risks of using certain ingredients, allowing you to make informed choices about the products you use.
  6. The Beauty Brains. It is a blog written by a group of cosmetic scientists dedicated to helping you understand what the chemicals used in cosmetics really do, how products are tested, and what all the advertising means.