[0:00] We gathered a group of Black women, mothers, we said, okay, you're in charge of testing its consumer reports. What would you like us to look at? And personal care products came up number one when we asked, okay, of all the personal care products we could test for you, what is number one on that list? And they said artificial braiding hair. We talked to a number of women that had negative reactions to artificial braiding hair, whether it was some inhalation irritant, they put the hair in and then they wake up and there are smells and odors and sometimes it gets so bad they have to take the hair back out. Hello everyone. Welcome to another episode of The Science of Life with me, Dr. Raven Baxter. I'm here with Dr. Jim Rogers of Consumer Reports.
[1:03] And we're here today to talk about our, and when I say our, I mean the culture as a collective, favorite cosmetic product, if you will, braiding hair. Now, this is just such a bittersweet conversation because, I mean, when you see these packs of hair, you think about maybe you're going on a vacation or you have a special event, or maybe you're just treating yourself and you want to look nice and you go to the beauty supply store and you say, what can I get to enhance what I have going on naturally? And a lot of times black women opt for breaks and it may not even be a special event.
[1:49] It may just be that you don't really want to be in your hair all the time. And so it is an icon of our culture. Braids, whether they be long, short, I think even for little black girls, when you get your first set of braids and you get the beads on it, that's really exciting. And my mom couldn't stop telling me to stop shaking my head all over the place. Like I hear the beads clacking around. Serena and Venus. Exactly. Yes. I mean, just iconic symbolism of our culture. And it's very special to us. And so for us to learn new things about braiding hair that isn't associated with positivity can be really difficult. And so I brought up a concern recently about braiding hair. And that led me to meeting you, Jim. And I'd love for you to just tell everybody what you do at Consumer Reports.
[2:49] What is your background and how did you get into looking at braiding hair? Let me start backwards. So I've been with Consumer Reports about eight and a half years. And I started out just doing food safety. Then they added nutrition to my responsibilities. And then they added product safety to my responsibilities about a year and a half ago. Before that, I was with the Department of Agriculture and I did a number of things. I was the designated federal official for a federal advisory committee called NACMF. You may have heard they've terminated those committees, which was an excellent committee trying to help all federal agencies. If they had any questions about food safety, we would assemble academicians. We would assemble the industry, federal employees, and would sit around a table and talk about how can we make food safer. So I was really sad when they terminated that.
[3:46] And that was recent? Yes, it was recent. I also did baseline surveys, which helps the food safety inspection service set limits on foodborne pathogens in meat, poultry, some egg products, et cetera. I also did a rotation through the chief scientific officer's office to talk about using molecular biology to track and trace foodborne illnesses. It was kind of at the cusp when whole genome sequencing was starting and the FDA and the CDC were really pushing on using that. And we were talking about how could we use it for food? So that was a great tool. Before that, I worked for the Department of Army. I did biowarfare defense.
[4:35] I built high containment laboratories, trained people, staffed them. And then we did a bunch of the unknown sample analysis, white powder analysis, white powder incidents. You might remember that people would mail you an envelope full of starch and say you've just contracted anthrax. Well, we had developed methods on rapid detection and identification of these things in environmental samples, water samples, and then I brought aboard, brought aboard food as a target for biowarfare. And it was defense. It was not an offensive program. I always tell people that. Before that, I was with the Navy and I basically did the same thing, ran laboratories, did environmental sampling and testing. Before that, I tried academia for a year.
[5:25] That didn't last for me. It just didn't click, even though I would love teaching and I love mentoring. And then before that, I came and moved to the DC area to do my postdoctoral studies on chica toxin producing E. coli with Alison O'Brien at Uniformed Services University. Great experience for three years. And so that's how I got here. I think your question was, how did we decide to test artificial braiding here? Yes. I mean, it seems like, well, from what I have read, braiding here has not been in the academic research discussion realm for very long. I was very curious. I brought up my concerns about synthetic braiding hair late last year. And as I was doing research, before I opened my mouth and yap on the internet about I'm concerned, what have scientists actually found that could answer some of the questions and not, it wasn't like a lot, you know, there had been, I could count on one hand, how many studies had been done. The earliest conversations
[6:29] about this happened in, I believe the sixties and the seventies, when synthetic hair fibers became more affordable and people began using them for implantation, um, like to address male pattern baldness, et cetera. And then, um, the government banned it as a medical device. And I just remember reading in one of the papers that the scientists wrote, they had concerns about this, not even being tested on animals before they put it into humans. And they mentioned that the nature of the materials that is, um, that synthetic hairs are composed of are carcinogenic and that is a concern. And so the FDA seized, they seized the synthetic hair implants. And I'm like reading this and I'm like looking at this and I'm like, there's no way we could just buy this. Granted that context is implantation, right. But why is it that there was no further discussion on, okay, it's not in the scalp, but what about on the scalp? What about prolonged exposure to something that y'all had concerns about
[7:38] carcinogenic ingredients? Like where, where did we go after that? And it seemed like we just, it didn't seem like many people knew about that. It did not. I don't think that conversation spilled over to the black community because we then after that saw a boom in synthetic hair usage. Um, and you look into the eighties, the nineties to two thousands braids are it. Um, if you didn't have braids, what were you doing? Uh, and so now we have maybe about a handful of studies that investigated the compounds that are released when these braids, this hair is heated, uh, burnt, when it is, I think people are now looking into boiling. Um, and then also just looking into the heavy metal, uh, components of the hair. And so all of those findings have been concerning to me, but I think that your study really caught a lot of people's attention because you are at consumer reports. You're a huge, um, leading institution, very much breaking ground in many different areas.
[8:47] And you have such a history of consumer protection and advocacy. So, um, for you all to conduct a study, like, how did you get to that point? Like, was this on anybody's radar? How did this happen? Well, consumer reports has been testing for almost 90 years now products to show if they're safe, they're reliable, uh, healthy, et cetera. What we did not do a lot of is personal care products. And we have been talking about how to test and what to test in personal care products for a number of years, but just could not find the right angle, um, and the right products. So for instance, I just talked to pure earth, which is a group that looks at lead contamination across the world.
[9:35] And they're testing cold, the dark eyeliner that a number of like middle Eastern countries, women in middle Eastern countries, where some of them with excessively high amounts of lead, right. Um, and some of these products are used on children, right. And some of these products are available online, Amazon, Temu, et cetera. And so we're talking with them, they're doing the testing, and we're talking with them about, you know, how did they choose their product? Maybe there's something we can do together in the future, et cetera. Um, but we had not figured out what we were going to test yet. Well, we gathered, uh, a group of black women mothers. We brought them up to consumer reports to tour the labs, talk to them. And then we had a conversation. We said, okay, you're in charge of testing its consumer reports. What would you like us to look at? Um, that was the gist of the conversation and personal care products came up number one, as you might imagine for black women,
[10:36] because they care about their skin, their hair, their body, et cetera. And when we asked, okay, of all the personal care products we could test for you, what is number one on that list? Because that's, you know, that's a huge list, shampoos and lipsticks and conditioners and edge control and all that. Okay. I know these things. I have two daughters and a wife that use this stuff and they said, artificial braiding hair, which kind of was like, so out of all that stuff, artificial braiding hair. And they said, yes. I said, okay.
[11:11] So we started doing the research. We started looking at it as a journalist, journalistic exercise. What can we find out there to write about? And if you read the story that you, you mentioned, you'll see, we talked to a number of women that had negative reactions to artificial braiding hair, whether it was some inhalation irritant, you know, they put the hair in and then they wake up and there are smells and odors. And sometimes it gets so bad. They have to take the hair back out. Uh, folliculitis, inflammation of the hair follicles, rashes, redness on the neck, on the face and the scalp. And so that's an acute reaction. Okay. That's something you put the hair in and something happens within 24, 48 hours or something like that. But that's hard to measure.
[11:59] It's hard to measure in a lab and acute reaction, at least the labs that we use. So we decided to look into the literature, the little bit of literature that there was, and there was a paper, as you mentioned, of looking at volatile organic compounds, these compounds we tested for being released when heated, but it was released in the air. And we said, okay, why don't we test the actual product for that the same way, but try to measure for these volatile organic compounds. The heavy metals part was more of a continuation of testing that we've done over the years. When I started eight and a half years ago, my first testing project was baby food for heavy metals. Okay. So we have experience with lead, cadmium, mercury, arsenic testing, mostly in food, but in talking with my chemists, I have two PhD level chemists on staff. I said, well, what else could we test for? VOCs, fine. I see that in the literature,
[12:54] but we didn't see any testing for heavy metals in the literature. May have missed it. Didn't see it. Okay. I said, well, let's try, try testing for heavy metals. So we decided to test for cadmium, arsenic and lead. And that's what we did. So it was really consumer driven. It was what black women wanted black mothers wanted us to test. And by the way, they want us to test other things, but for sure that was at the top of the list. And so when we finished that discussion, I said, well, and I think I mentioned this to you before I did what I call retail recon. I went to my local beauty supply store. There was a wall of hair and I'm like, this is going to be huge. And I don't have the resources or the money. Plus they wanted me to test this, to go with this article. As you notice, it came out during black history month. So I had to get this testing done, validated,
[13:45] written up for this article. So I said, okay, what if we test the top 10 products in sales, but we also asked the mothers, what would you like us to test of what you use? What are the products that you use with your children with your own hair? And then we combined that list and we identify 10 different products that we were going to purchase. So you have to be able to purchase it at retail because we always purchase our samples that we test at retail. So we purchase what you use. And I said, okay, well, let's keep it to the black and the brown hair because, you know, if I do the purples and the blues and the reds and all that, the sample size would just expand, would explode. And so we purchased them and we blinded them, sent them to the lab and had them tested. And the results are in the paper of what we found.
[14:38] And this was heartbreaking to read. I mean, from a scientific perspective, you know, that one study is never enough to draw a full conclusion on a concern. But when you conduct research, you get an answer that often leads you to a myriad of other questions that also need answers. Yes. And this, I mean, even given the small sample size, that is a huge concern that you had a small sample size and still found this. And imagine if you expanded this to all of the different permutations and possibilities of hair. I mean, even just picking these up, I was overwhelmed. There were three aisles of hair products. And by the way, none of which have any information about what's actually in this on the back. You might get a, you might get a Konecalon, it says a hundred percent Konecalon flame retardant fiber. But aside from that, what is that? But let's talk about the results of this paper, right?
[15:51] Oh, and let me say before we start on that part that we recognize this was a small project, but we we do pilot projects to start out for the bigger projects, because we want to see if there's a there there before we invest our time and resources in a larger product project. And you note that even with the small sample size, as we'll get into every product that we tested had some type of problem with it. And some products had multiple possible issues that are health affecting to women. And so it was kind of saddening to see that. But it also told us we were onto something.
[16:31] And we're hoping that the data that we find will stimulate people to do even more testing and more investigation. Because as you noted, this is part of our culture. This is probably the first testing I've ever done that is really related to my culture. I have two daughters that used to use braiding hair. So I have a concern, a personal concern in that. Like I mentioned to you before we started, I found some of their hair when I was cleaning out the basement, still in the package. And so I think that this particular study, probably of everything that I've done rates up there is the top because I think it has some long legs. We really need to do something about this based on the small sample size that we found, because I think it may unveil a much larger problem, sadly.
[17:22] Absolutely. I mean, and we we're not going to dive too deep into the science here. But we, you, we, because I take pride in your work, because this is great work. Join the club. Come on. You know, like, you found carcinogens in all of these products. Carcinogen is a cancer-causing agent and dangerous chemicals in 100% of these products. And these are the top 10 products. It's the top 10 combined with the mother's suggestions. And so some of them overlapped. In fact, I had a number of people come to me after they saw the product list saying, I use that. I'm like, yeah, I understand, you know.
[18:05] And so let's list off some of these chemicals. Benzene, which is a known carcinogen. Can you tell us more about benzene and what we know about benzene? Benzene is part of the volatile organic compounds, which are mostly man-made compounds that are used to manufacture other things such as pharmacological products. And benzene, according to my chemists, who actually advised me on how we should rank them this way, is one of the most dangerous chemicals from a carcinogenicity standpoint that you could use in the lab. In fact, he told me, his name is Eric Boring, he told me that in labs they urge you to use something else other than benzene because it is known to be a potent carcinogen. And so when we found that, we found it in three out of the 10 products that was extremely concerning. Now, what I have to note is that, as you said, when they implanted the hair, then they band it. And this lays on top of our scalp. So what we are
[19:15] concerned about, number one, we don't think any benzene should be there in period, but we are concerned that there are some ways that this chemical is going to get into your body and affect you either absorb through the skin, inhaled, or as we used as a model that you ingest it. You know, we know kids put braids in their mouth, right? This stuff is brittle. It could probably flake off and you could inhale or swallow. And so finding benzene there was extremely concerning because of its carcinogenicity. Three out of 10 products, yes. But, you know, that's still 30%. Yes. Your skin can absorb chemicals. And think about if you have an open wound on your head. I mean, as many of these people who have used this hair and have gotten reactions that could blister, that could compromise the surface of the skin, it's just not looking good. Okay.
[20:09] Chloroform. Mm-hmm. Yes. Methylene chloride. Every sample had methylene chloride at some level. And these are probable now, probable carcinogens, meaning that there's significant data that confirms that they could be cancer-causing, but there could be some dispute. Styrene. What else do we have? 1,2-dichloroethane. And these are things that we don't hear about, really. But in the scientific community, there have been flags raised for these chemicals. Naphthalene, which sounds familiar. Where have we heard naphthalene from? Gosh. Maybe just going out and about in my scientific life, I've heard of that. But none of these are good for you. And then going to lead, you tested for cadmium, arsenic, and lead. And none of the products had detectable arsenic, which is good news. Three of the products had detectable cadmium, but the exposure and risk analysis found that the levels did not pose a risk. And lead was detected in nine of the 10 products.
[21:27] Yes. And to the extent where one of the products had 610 percent of the maximum allowable dose level, and that is for an ingestion model? Yes. Okay. But still, it's concerning. And let's talk more about this model. Because from the critiques that I've seen going around on the internet, everyone is just kind of going back to this point of, I'm not going to eat the hair. I have put braids in my mouth as a child with ADHD. I was chewing on everything. I didn't really have any discernment. I was a kid. And so, yeah, I was eating the hair. Yeah. I was eating. I know what it tastes like. I know what it's like when it gets in your mouth, and you find these little pieces of black stuff in your teeth. Yeah. Like, this is, this is fair.
[22:23] It's very fair. And they make these products, hold on, for kids. Yes. Look at Miss Mama in the back. Very beautiful. But she might be eating his hair. I did.
[22:39] But anyway, even if we're not eating the hair, let's say, if we want to make the argument like, okay, I'm not, I'm definitely not going to eat it. Why did you all go with the ingestion model? Obviously, there are other models available, but we would love to take a walk with you on the scientific research process. So we mentioned in the article that there were probably three different ways to be exposed. One would be inhalation. And we noted that, again, we're concerned by the ends of the hair being boiled to close the ends or you flame it or you use a hot iron and it releases these VOCs. The other was absorption through the skin. And the other was ingestion. The true exposure is probably all three for women that wear the hair. And the braiders too. Yes, the braiders too. We'll, we'll get to that in a second. But we felt that even at very small amounts, even if you were only
[23:43] accidentally ingesting this because you put it in your mouth or because it's brittle and it's on your hands and you don't wash your hands and you eat or drink or whatever, that with the California maximum allowable dose level for lead being used as an ingestion model that we could demonstrate that if you just use just that one model that you're going to exceed the limits for ingestion and the limits are very small and the amount of hair that you would have to ingest would be very small too. Can I say, is it important that you go by a, an established standard like that? Is it important from an advocacy standpoint so that you can say, um, this product is potentially dangerous or?
[24:32] You know, that's a really good softball. You just pitched me because there is no standard. And so there is no information at the FDA that says this level of lead in this product is harmful versus the other. And so we have to use what we have available until we have a better model, right? And so by going for the California standards, that does a couple of things. Number one, Consumer Reports has said there's no level of lead that is safe in food and water. And we said, shouldn't that be for braiding hair? Something that you wear four to six weeks in your head, close to your face and your neck and your mouth and all the rest of that.
[25:17] Second thing is, is that whenever someone sets a protective level, California, uh, Prop 65 and the other attempts that they have done has a lower level, which we think is more protective anyway. Right. And then the third thing to answer your question, it is better to have a, a level that has been shown, proven with data, et cetera, than one that you're going to make up yourself. Right. So while, and, and you and I know as scientists that we're open to discussion, if you have a better model, let's talk. Right. My issue is with our critiques is that they have not come to talk to us, that a lot of it's been on the, the social media and whatever, but I've invited in other forums, you have another model, you have data, let's talk, let's figure it out. Maybe you're right. I'll give you that. Maybe you're right. Maybe there's a different model. Maybe the inhalation model is
[26:18] better, but you gotta have data. Right. And you gotta have, um, information that you can talk to as to why you think your model is better. Right. But that hasn't happened. Um, the other thing we said is that, um, we admitted that the levels of some of these products were low. No. But again, should there be any benzene in the product? Another thing is that one of the products that we tested for the heavy metals had none of the heavy metals at a detectable level. So that tells us that someone is manufacturing a pro a product that probably does not have these heavy metals and they're doing it right from the heavy metal standpoint.
[27:04] We would suggest that the other manufacturers should do the same thing to figure out what they're doing to not include lead in their product. Yep. And the rest of you do it too. So we don't expose women and children to a possible harmful level of lead while they're using artificial braiding here. Correct me if I'm wrong, but consumer reports, one of is, is one of the first things that you all rang an alarm about, um, the toys, the lead in the kids toys. Well, not one of the first things, but that is among them. Yes. I'm not an expert. And again, that is a licking model because you have lead paint on the outside of toys.
[27:44] What do kids do? They put it in their mouth, right? Lead is transferred. And so, like I said, when I first started, we were testing for the heavy metals and baby food. And we came out with the results of some, uh, baby food that had lead in it. And in fact, our data has been used by the federal government to try to set standards for lead concentrations in various foods. So I completely agree. If we can find a way so that there are not these chemicals of concern in these products, we should absolutely find that way. So what we say, Raven, is, I don't mean to cut you off, I'm sorry, but what we say is, if you have one product out of 10 that doesn't have lead, they're doing something right.
[28:31] And so what we tend to say is, especially for the things like benzene and lead, it shouldn't be there. And what can we do, what can we show to get that out of these products, even if it's a small amount, you know, because one of our critiques was, well, you're talking about small amounts of benzene. But just recently, didn't they recall an acne product because of trace, which means little, levels of benzene? I think they did, like within the last week or two. So if the FDA can recall products for benzene, why do we not be concerned about benzene and braiding hair? I'm looking at you, FDA.
[29:17] Y'all have to do something. Simply put, this needs to be further investigated. People deserve protection. And if there are concerning findings, we need to address that one way or another. And so I'm very energized by this research. I thank you so much. I mean, it was such a serendipitous sequence of events because I put my neck out there last December making the video. It ended up going viral. I was not expecting that because I don't know what I was expecting, to be honest. But I did want to use my platform to offer a voice of concern once I saw what was in the literature and then realizing that the research kind of just stopped after maybe a few years ago.
[30:07] I said, I don't think there could be some issues with this. And that video got millions and millions and millions of views. I didn't know, obviously, that you were conducting this research. And so I was very glad when Consumer Reports reached out and they let me know that you all were conducting this study and that it was going to be released to the public. And when I read through the findings, I mean, a lot of people were alarmed, but I was like, you know, I don't have to guess anymore. And there's a lot of anxiety when you don't have answers. And this gives some answers.
[30:50] And I think we get a little bit of our power back because we are consumers. We are giving people our money and we don't have to support things that we don't necessarily believe in or it could be harmful to us. So, but we want to support. I mean, I know there are some Black-owned companies that have focused on, they prioritize making braiding hair that is safe for us to use. Now, we don't have any research to actually vet any of these products. So, again, what does this industry look like moving forward? You know, how can I, let's assume that we walk into a store and this is on the shelf.
[31:41] What's missing from this that should be there? I mean, what does the future of braiding hair look like?
[31:51] I guess I'm not even sure what can we expect. Let me take your first indication about alternative products. We mentioned in the story that there are products that are either labeled less toxic. They're labeled hypoallergenic, which means that's less allergic reactions to them. Safer, et cetera.
[32:16] And as you also mentioned, a number of these are made primarily by Black women, from what I could see. I've done some research and I'm actually making a list of these products and their claims based on the Internet. I haven't, you know, ordered any and read the back of the packages or whatever. But we are also interested in testing those two. And so, I know there's one called Rebundle that is made of banana fiber. There's another product that says it's made out of collagen. There's another product that says it is washed Konecalon. There's another product that said it is Japanese Konecalon. Oh, my gosh. And so, as we mentioned before, there is no regulatory requirements for accurate label.
[33:04] And we'll talk about the products in a second. So, we have to test these. And so, I have a list of about 10 alternative products right now. We're still doing some searching. And I've proposed to my bosses at Consumer Reports, let's test alternatives. Because one of the criticisms also was, but you didn't tell us what we could do, right? Yeah. No. You didn't tell us what we could purchase and use. They want alternatives. Right. But again, as I explained, this was a fast 10 product test that I could not include the alternatives. And in fact, I didn't know about some of them until the story came out.
[33:43] Then they actually started reaching out to us. And so, I want to test those two. The thing about is, Raven, and you'll understand this, that when it's primarily a chemical product, you do chemical testing. But some of these products are biological. So, I'll probably have to figure out a way to test for bacterial or mold contamination or something like that, too. And so, the testing palette's going to be a little bit larger. But yes, we're interested in that. And one of my concerns is that, again, these are small vendors. Yes. Because once the story hit, my daughter actually tried to order some. And they were sold out and couldn't tell her when they were going to get more in.
[34:27] So, even if we want to do better, and I'm not endorsing any of these yet because I haven't tested them yet. So, let's be clear about that. But even if you want to try an alternative product, they're so small, I'm wondering, I'm concerned, can they supply the market as people consider shifting from the Konecalon type of products to these? So, that's one concern. The other concern I have, and I'm not a businessman or marketing or anything like that, is that if the market does start shifting, are they going to get bought up? And then the formulation changed. I'm very concerned about that, too, because there's going to be a tug between, well, I want to supply my people, but, you know, here's this over here.
[35:11] Now, I'm not, you know, coming down on any of the owners. I don't know them personally or anything like that. But that is a concern that if we do get some market shifting, you know, will they look at, look as a very nice target for acquisition? But that's, you know, that's not science. So, there is that concern. But what I would love that, as we noted in the article, we're not telling you not to use this right now, right? What we're doing is presenting our concerns with the product based on testing. But I would love that there would be more choice in the market. And if we choose, if the women choose to use something that either says, but more importantly, has been shown to be safer, that they would consider using that.
[35:58] Now, pricing, I think those products are more expensive right now than the Conecolon-based products. They are, generally, yeah. The color choices, the texture choices from my limited investigation are more limited than the Conecolon products. But they are there. And so, if more and more testing, you and I know somebody who's tested some of these products, and hopefully their paper will be out soon. Yes. But as more and more information comes out, and as people like you help translate what that information is to the audience, the Afro-Latina, the Black audience, maybe that will help them make wiser choices that are safer or healthier for them down the line.
[36:47] Right now, we're kind of in a gray zone. We don't know. But I'm hoping that our article, people like you, others that have called for more testing, more research, more investigation, that our HBCUs, our public health departments, our medical schools will somehow see this as something that they can latch on to and really try to contribute even more data and information to it. Absolutely. And I really want to emphasize that the bulk of this work has been done by Black people. Oh, yeah. It has been Black people pushing this issue forward, carrying this load. And we, like as a scientific community, need support from our community.
[37:31] Our voices matter. Our dollar matters. So, if you're wondering, what do I do? Support a Black scientist, right? Figure out how you can support their research. This needs to be looked into. And so, let's talk about, like, the future, right? I'm not here to give recommendations to anybody about what they should do, but this is an ongoing scientific discovery process. It's, to me, a very exciting time because, finally, we are getting answers that should have been answered a long time ago. For this product to be in these products and products like that, to be in so many stores, in so many communities, in such a huge quantity, and for us to not have fundamental answers about the composition and the risk and the exposure, like, that is unacceptable.
[38:24] So, we have to demand answers. Does the future look like, I guess, how do we get these things regulated? Do we want regulation? What does that mean for us as a community if the government can, all of a sudden, potentially take this off the shelves, if they decide to? A number of things. In the article, there's a petition that consumers can sign up on. And, again, the article's free. It's in front of the paywall, so you don't have to be a member of Consumer Reports. We would love you to be a member, but you don't have to be a member to get the article. There's a petition to have the FDA start regulating these products.
[39:07] We noted in the article, we reached out to them, and no one that I read in their email responses said, you know, this is our product. So, a petition to get them to regulate it. And it's not regulated because what? We know they regulate cosmetics. That is a discussion we've had at Consumer Reports back and forth. So, the Food, Drug, and Cosmetics Act, I think I got that right, covers cosmetics like lotions and so on and so forth. I mentioned the acne medicine that are topical, so on the surface of the skin. But my impression, I may be wrong, but my impression is that the braiding hair is considered like a bracelet or a necklace that you're putting it on.
[39:54] You're adding it to the skin, attaching it to the hair, but it doesn't necessarily go inside the body. It can't be absorbed through the skin like acne medicine with benzene in it, right? And so, we would want them to reinterpret that. We think that if you're wearing something for four to six weeks against your scalp, against your neck, against your face, that there is contact and possible absorption of whatever's in that. Because they could also argue it's a textile. Right. But you're not wearing – it's not a shirt that you can – No. You know what I mean? 24-7, you're wearing this, right? The other thing you mentioned is the labeling.
[40:35] We would want the FDA to mandate labeling of that product because not only is it connected on fiber, but it's also whatever you're going to use to texturize it, whatever you're going to use to dye it. And, you know, some dyes FDA has banned lead acetate in, but where this stuff is made overseas, have they banned it? I don't know, but you know, the reds and the blues and the purples that you see, that's coming from some type of dye. Even the browns and the blacks can be dyed, too. And so, we want a label that says exactly what's in there, what's been used, et cetera, in addition to the Conecalon fiber.
[41:18] We noted in our story, nine of the ten products were labeled Conecalon of some type. And number ten had no label. So, mandatory labeling, we would want mandatory testing. We want the manufacturers to test the product, either incoming ingredients, such as the Conecalon going for dyeing, or in product, before they ship it over here, to make sure that it does not have anything harmful in it or potentially harmful. We want that type of testing mandated by the FDA, because most of it's an imported product, right? So, it should be tested. And in this political climate, as we mentioned, California and Prop 65, it may be that state-by-state, especially the states that are willing to do this, we may have to get a state-by-state reg in place for this product.
[42:14] There are a number of states, I think at my last count, there were like five different states, including New York, that are looking for a Safe Cosmetics Act, and we want them to add braiding hair to that Safe Cosmetics Act. So, for consumers that live in these particular states, call your congresspeople, call your state senates and say, you have bill, I don't know the numbers, bill 123 coming up. Please add braiding hair to this, and please have mandatory testing, et cetera. And please set levels, because as we talked about, there's no levels either. And so, I think that's how we're going to attack it right now until we have a little bit more fertile ground in D.C.
[43:00] And with the federal government to actually make legal regulatory changes that are effective in regulating this product. Thank you for that. I think that gives people a lot of momentum. You know, what can I do? Even if you're not in a position where you can stop using the hair, I get that. But we have to put some force behind this so that we can see some changes. And on a completely different note, I just want to address, because I know some of you are watching, and you're going to say, well, I'm just going to go and use human hair instead of the synthetic hair. Do you happen to have any thoughts on that at this time?
[43:41] I mean, obviously, human hair was not included in this study. I know there is another scientist who is approaching that research question in addition to the synthetic hair and in addition to the plant-based or non-toxic as advertised hair. What are your thoughts on that? A couple. Number one is even the human hair is treated, because sometimes that hair is dyed, too. Right? And so we would have a concern that, and included in the request for testing, because do the dyes have lead acetate, for instance? The other concern that we have is, is that exploitive of the women that are selling their hair for this purpose?
[44:26] Another concern is that it tends to be more expensive. Yes. How do I know I've bought hair for my daughters? Yes. So I have an idea of the price points, right? And then probably finally, again, is there enough hair to sustain the market, human hair to sustain the market? Will that force more and more women into that to address that market that may or may not want to sell their hair? Because of the economic viability of doing that, again, does it become more exploitive to that group? So, yeah, we do have some concerns, in addition to the alternatives, we're talking about testing human hair, too, probably the ones that appear more dyed, colored, that type of thing, because of the concern of that processing of that hair to get it ready for market.
[45:18] Well, thank you so much for this work. How can we support you, Dr. Rogers? Well, Consumer Reports itself is a nonprofit. We take no advertising from any of the products that we test. And so, number one, keep us in your thoughts and prayers, because we are trying to do good work that's that protect consumers. Number two, if you're so inclined, join Consumer Reports. Oh, you can join. Yeah. We're a membership-based audience. I didn't know that. Yes. It's a club. Yes. Now, all of the safety, food safety, water safety, this product safety are in front of the paint wall, so you don't have to pay to get to that information.
[46:04] Because, for instance, our survey knows that Black people care about food safety, too. But we already do food safety, right? But you can join Consumer Reports from time to time. We have our own surveys that we ask our members their opinions about things. Join the petitions. For most of the stories that I've worked on when we're trying to change federal regulation, there is a petition. And we will petition state. We'll petition manufacturers to change their practices to produce safer products. And I've already mentioned, write your congresspeople, write your state congresspeople, write the companies. Now, one thing I do have to note as a side note, it was kind of difficult to find all of the company addresses and emails and stuff.
[46:53] We found them for most of the part. And we did have two company responses that are in the story. But I think, Raven, that this is going to be on us, right? This is going to be on us to use our own power to try to make a change. You know, I have a love-hate relationship with social media because of some of the things we just said. But I also see this is very, very powerful of getting the information out. And again, people like you and other people that are going to help interpret the science into, you know, pieces and morsels that people can understand, I think are going to be very important.
[47:33] But I really think that this is on us and it's going to be on us to actually make a difference here. Absolutely. And this is a very important conversation to have. And I know a lot of people attack this report as fear-mongering, which is, you know, when we are, no matter what the subject is, it seems like these days so many things are sensationalized. And oftentimes... Wait, wait. Did you find the article sensationalized? No. I really want your opinion because... I didn't. We try not to install fear because, as I said, we didn't say, stop using this product, your head's going to fall off or something like that.
[48:13] What we said is, here's some information. It's not the entire story. It's an early part of the story, but it was important enough for us to get it to you. Yes. Consumers. So that you at least will consider the information, the suggestions, like we said. Maybe don't wear your hair braids for four to six weeks. Maybe cut that down. But also for you to be aware of what's coming down the pike. You and I just talked about there is more research out there that you and I know that will be coming down. I think our findings confirm some other papers that were out there, but they didn't name the brands.
[48:49] Right. Exactly. I think this paper that you and I know about is going to come out that's going to confirm what we found. And that's going to really shake a lot of things up. And I think, and because I was already aware of the research coming down the pike, this was kind of like an appetizer to wet the palate for the conversation, the deeper conversations that we're going to have when we start to look at every single facet of this huge issue or at least huge research topic, I should say. Yes. But, you know, I just want to say. Because of the Raven, I did not want this just to sit on the shelf until we had more.
[49:30] And I did not want this to sit on the shelf until there was somebody else publishing, too. When we found that, we're like, we got to get this out. Yeah. Now, if it scared you, I'm sorry, but I hope that conversations like this will kind of like tamp this down and say, wait a second. Oh, it will. And I think just explaining really quick about peer review, right? Consumer Reports being an independent nonprofit organization that relies on donation to support the research, you all can publish things on your own. And you vet your own work, you have a team of professionals, PhD, you know, degreed, credentialed people conducting this work.
[50:11] And you don't have to jump through a lot of the hoops necessarily to get your research out there versus working at an institution. You might do a preprint or something and just get something out there on the archive, maybe. But the greater standard is to go through a peer review process where, first of all, your research has to be accepted into it, first and foremost, and deemed important or worthy of a peer review. And then it goes through a review process. And there's a lot of hiccups and politics that can go into that as well. That's not a perfect process. And Black research and Black people tend to get the shorter end of the stick when it comes to the peer review process, unfortunately.
[50:58] And so a lot of the research that is on things like this and concerning us, there could be systemic reasons why it hasn't made it to the forefront yet that we aren't aware of. So, well, but our audience is different, too. Yes. Right. I mean, this started out as a journalistic exercise to get a written document out about artificial braiding hair. And you're familiar with the author who wrote the paper. We decided to add the testing on to it because that's what we do. Right. We have published papers in peer review articles at Consumer Reports, right? There you go. And so we do have that level.
[51:43] But for this particular story and for the urgency, we felt we would use our journalistic opportunities to get the information out. While, again, we're going to do more testing, we're talking to people that are doing peer review research on this subject, too. But we can get the information out at different levels and it still be valid. Right. Facts. A peer review paper's audience is not a Consumer Reports audience, per se. It can be, but it's not. They're two different audiences and that's what we shoot for. But we still do a scientific method. We vet it internally. Our data sets went through my two chemists to review and to give their comments and so on and so forth, plus myself, plus another guy who does machine learning just because he's really good with data.
[52:38] So we had at least four sets of eyeballs on the data set by itself, at least. Right. So, I mean, is it at peer review level? No, but that wasn't his intention. Right. Right. So. I'm very thankful. Thank you so much for the opportunity to talk about this. And is there anything that we didn't get to cover today that you feel is important for our audience to know? Let me know. Well, I think, Raven, I want to urge your audience, our audience, to just keep their eyes open, be willing to learn, be willing to consider new information, maybe in a format that they're not used to, but be willing to ask questions, too.
[53:21] Because I think 95, 90, 95% of the scientists love to talk about themselves and their work. So don't be afraid to ask them questions. And I always tell all my staff, there's no dumb question. Right. No, that's what that's why we have careers. We just keep asking questions. So if you all want to think like how we think, don't stop asking questions. Be skeptical and use the tools and the resources available to you to get answers. And if that means asking a scientist to get an answer, I'm here. Dr. Rogers is here. And we are more than happy to address any concerns you may have.
[54:06] I don't know everything. He doesn't know everything. But we have a community of people who care. And that is why we do what we do. So thank you for watching. And stay tuned for the next episode. And follow Consumer Reports. And have a great day. Bye, y'all. Be safe. Take care.
[54:37] Thank you.