Asian J Beauty Cosmetol. 2013; 11(5): 827-833.

A Review of Safety Evaluations of Cosmetic Preservatives

The various ingredients have been used to improve the qualities and prolong the preservation in cosmetics. The preservative is considered as one of the most important ingredients to keep the cosmetics for long and also safely as it has anti-septic and anti-fungal functions. However, several previous studies have demonstrated that there are some potential factors causing allergies, and some issues related with side effects of cosmetic preservatives have been reported through various media. On the other hand, the government which has implemented detailed policies on the preservative uses in cosmetics still has insisted the safety of cosmetic preservative uses with some organizations. These lead to a great interest on the safety of preservatives in cosmetics. Therefore, this paper has researched and analyzed the official legislations and regulations, chemical properties and previous studies on cosmetic preservatives to give recent and correct information. Even though the government has enhanced the ingredients labeling performed with safety and quality managements on cosmetics lately, some studies still have demonstrated that preservatives can causes side effects. As an alternative to these preservatives, natural preservatives have had a huge attention lately. However, they are still required to get researched further in terms of safety. Therefore, the main purpose of this paper is to provide an updated overview on the occurrence of preservatives in cosmetics for the safe cosmetic uses to people.

Keywords : Preservative, Cosmetic, Side effect, Legislation, Chemical property