OBJECTIVE: The aim of this study was to identify the presence of mercury in skin whitening products, and to identify products containing mercury with the concentration exceeding the limitation of 1 ppm.
METHODOLOGY: A total of 104 whitening products were selected from the market via random sampling technique. The mercury concentration was determined by accredited laboratory, and the results were later compared with the cosmetic guideline of Malaysia and the list of banned products issued by NPRA.
RESULTS: A total of 51.9% (n = 54) whitening products were found registered under the NPRA Quest system and remaining 48.1% (n = 50) were non-registered products. None of the whitening products listed mercury as an ingredient, but laboratory analysis showed 15.4% (n = 16) of the products contained mercury with the concentration exceeding the maximum limit of 1 ppm. A total of 87.5% of the whitening products (14 out of 16) containing high mercury concentration were non-registered products which were not registered in NPRA Quest system. The exceeded concentration recorded ranged between 1.81 ppm and 838 123 ppm. Besides that, 50% (8 out of 16) of the products were found in the list of banned products issued by the NPRA of Malaysia.
CONCLUSIONS: This study presents the status of cosmetic products, particularly the skin whitening products available in Malaysia market. Concern arises when some of the products were found to have presence of harmful substances such as mercury. Even though the presence of mercury in a cosmetic product can either be non-intentional or intentionally used by the manufacturer in the cosmetic formulation, the impact of the ingredient can cause health risk to the users.
OBJECTIVE: This systematic review aims to enlighten the current detection tools developing for fatty acids profile authentication analyses of cosmetic ingredients based on the effectiveness, halal status, safety, advantages and disadvantages of the methods.
METHODOLOGY: The data were extracted from the scientific literatures published between October 2015 and 2020 in the Web of Science, Scopus and Google Scholar databases, and analyzed with Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses (PRISMA).
FINDINGS: Based on the systemic literature reviews, essential oil, argan oil, mineral oil, vegetable oil, and jojoba oil were among the mostly studied ingredients in cosmetics. Furthermore, a combination of more than one analytical instrument was utilized to profile fatty acids while the determination of the origin of the fatty acids is under scrutiny. The portable mass spectrometer combined with a direct inlet membrane (DIM) probe seems to be the best tool in terms of time consumption, cost, requires no sample preparation with high efficiency. The current review showed that the best cosmetic base is when the oil is composed of high concentration of fatty acids such as linoleic, oleic, stearic acid, and palmitic acids with concentration range from 19.7 - 46.30%, which offers various beneficial properties to cosmetic products.
OBJECTIVE: This review paper aimed to shed light on the skin-whitening ingredients and their issues related to safety, health risk, and halal status.
METHODOLOGY: Based on the reviews scientific publications published from January 2015 to July 2020 using Web of Science and Scopus engines.
FINDINGS: Based on the review, most of the common ingredients in the skin-whitening products are originated from plants, animals, microbes, and heavy metals. Health risk of the ingredients was evaluated based on the usage, chronic or acute adverse effect, frequency of incidence, and the hazardous chemical contents of a halal cosmetics. The halal status of the ingredients was investigated based on the sources of origin, safety evaluation, and associated health risk of the ingredients.
ORIGINALITY: This review shows that ingredients play a vital role in the halal status decision-making of a cosmetic product. Therefore, the categories of Halal-Safe, Haram-Prohibited, and Critical-Need further evaluation were suggested to integrate the sources of ingredients with safety.