Your hair feels so good when it’s freshly shampooed. It glows, it shines, and it infuses your most porous organ with carcinogens and hormone disruptors. Yes, most commercial shampoos actually contain stuff you wouldn’t want to put on your car, never mind your scalp. Don’t take it from me, check out the Skin Deep website at www.cosmeticsdatabase.org. There, the Environmental Working Group has compiled a database of every cosmetic or beauty product you can think of, rated for toxicity. Yes, toxicity. Coal tar, parabens, propylene glycol and sodium laurel sulphate are just a few of the ingredients found in shampoos and personal cleaning products, and they have a disturbing list of health risks to go along with their foaming and shining properties. Since they aren’t biodegradable, their ill effects carry on into the water system, long after they’ve left your bathtub. See the Chapter 15, “How to Get Clean and Beautiful,” for lots of fabulous earth-friendly options.
Look for vegetable-based soaps or glycerine soaps. Bar soaps mean much less packaging—it’s easy to find biodegradable bar soaps anywhere from health stores to gift shops.
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