Originally published in The Nano Newswire
A new federal bill will reform and amend aspects of the Food,
Drug, and Cosmetic Act of 1938, to require much greater regulation
of cosmetic products manufactured, imported, distributed and sold
in the United States. The bill requires the detailed disclosure of
ingredients, including nanomaterial ingredients and even
contaminants from the manufacturing process or packaging at
specified levels, that can be found in the final cosmetic products
used by consumers. The disclosure is required both on product
packaging and by publication, and applies to in-store, professional
salon and internet retail sales of cosmetics.
The Safe Cosmetics Act of 2011 (the
"Act") (H.R. 2359) was recently introduced in the House
of Representatives by its lead sponsor, Rep. Janice Schakowsky of
Illinois, and several co-sponsors. The Act includes a detailed
scheme to require the Food and Drug Administration
("FDA") to obtain what may have traditionally been
proprietary information from cosmetic manufacturers concerning the
chemical ingredients and certain contaminants present in their
products, and assess them for safety. The Act contains a process
for phasing out of use substances that are either known to be or
proven to be toxic, and making all product ingredient and
contaminant information more available and transparent to
consumers.
Although a comprehensive summary of the Act's provisions is
beyond the scope of this blog, Section 613 of the Act is remarkable
as it requires "that the label on each package of
cosmetics...bears a declaration of the name of each ingredient in
such cosmetic in descending order of prominence." The Act
requires rule-making by the FDA to establish requirements for
listing ingredients on labels, how such labels are to be made for
products that are too small in size to contain the required label
or are sold on the internet, and for public disclosure of the
ingredients. The Act specifically authorizes regulations by FDA for
requiring nanomaterial labeling concerning "minerals or other
particulate ingredients" as "nano-scale" on a
cosmetic label if more than one percent of the ingredients in the
cosmetic "are 100 nanometers or smaller in not less than 1
dimension," or if such ingredients "possess
scale-specific hazard properties." Any ingredient required by
the Act to be listed on a label, shall not be treated as a trade
secret, and only "[t]he concentration of cosmetic ingredients
used in a finished cosmetic shall be considered confidential
business information and may not be made available to the
public...." These labeling requirements will become effective
within 18 months of enactment of the Act, and shall apply to all
cosmetics available for retail sale, and to all manufacturers,
distributors, and internet vendors of such cosmetics.
The Act was referred to the Committees on Energy and Commerce and Education and the Workforce. We will follow the progress of the Act here for our readers.
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