Your Nail Polish Could Be Disrupting Your Hormone System

Your Nail Polish Could Be Disrupting Your Hormone System


As my 10-year old daughter handed me her sleeping bag and pillow after the spa party, I noticed that her nails were decorated with multi-colored stickers. She said that she knew I worked in environmental health and wouldn’t want her to get her nails painted.



I cringed but simultaneously rejoiced. I had officially become “that mom”—the one whose kid passed on nail polish because it might be toxic. I was especially relieved when I saw the latest report from the Environmental Working Group (EWG), the nonprofit research and advocacy organization where I am executive director.

That report, called “Nailed: Endocrine Disruptor in Nail Polish Gets in Women’s Bodies,” reaffirmed my daughter’s choice to skip nail polish. It recounted the results of a scientific study co-authored by researcher Heather Stapleton of Duke University and EWG toxicologist Johanna Congleton that found that a chemical added to nail polish to make it more flexible and chip-resistant got into the bodies of all 26 women who volunteered to paint their nails for the study. The evidence showed up in their urine within half a day.

These findings could have serious implications for nail polish users, especially for children, ‘tweens and teens. Scientists suspect that the chemical at issue—triphenyl phosphate, or TPHP—disrupts the hormone system. Researchers have linked hormone disruptors such as TPHP to early onset of puberty, neurodevelopmental problems and obesity. The last thing girls need in their bodies as they are developing rapidly is something that may play havoc with their hormones. What’s worse, nail art is all the rage among the vulnerable age group. The nail industry estimates that nine out of 10 girls between the ages 12 and 14 use nail products, sometimes daily.

These girls are likely to have been exposed to TPHP from multiple sources over years. It is often used as a fire retardant infused into foam furniture. From furniture, it and other fire retardant chemicals migrate into household dust, and from there, into people—especially children. EWG biomonitoring tests conducted in 2008 discovered that babies and toddlers, who play on the floor, typically had triple the amounts of fire retardant chemicals in their bodies as their mothers. A 2014 study by Duke and EWG found that children’s exposure to TPHP was on average nearly three times that of adults. Evidence of the chemical was found in all 26 children tested in the 2014 study.

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http://msmagazine.com/blog/2015/10/21/your-nail-polish-could-be-disrupting-your-hormone-system/