Civic Register
| 3.1.18

Senate Plans A Regulatory Makeover For The Cosmetics Industry

Join us and tell your reps how you feel!

What’s the story?

Senators on the Committee on Health, Education, Labor & Pensions are spearheading an effort to enact regulations concerning the cosmetics and personal care industry for the first time since 1938. Consumer groups have pushed for greater regulations on ingredients and labeling for years, but now industry, suffering from brand perception that large companies push unsafe products on the public, are getting behind the effort.

Committee Chairman Sen. Lamar Alexander (R-TN) and ranking member Sen. Patty Murray (D-WA) have reached a tentative agreement, called a discussion draft, aimed at getting a bill on the Senate floor in the coming months.

Highlights of the agreement include:

  • Requiring companies to register with the FDA no later than 60 days after beginning to make cosmetics and beauty products

  • Requiring notification of the Food & Drug Administration (FDA) within 15 days of any bad reaction from cosmetics

  • Requiring the FDA evaluate a number of ingredients for safety

  • Creating a more complex safety standard for ingredients

Currently, no money is being appropriated via the agreement to pay for the FDA testing and other administrative work that would be involved. This concerns consumer safety groups, who fear any legislation would give theoretical authority without the budget to actually assess safety.

Procter & Gamble, on of the largest brand manufacturers issued a statement in support of the "the bipartisan effort currently under way to strengthen and modernize FDA oversight of the cosmetic industry" according to the Wall Street Journal.

The House, as of yet, has not begun to formulate any related agreement, though the House Energy and Commerce Committee is reportedly "gathering information".

What do you think?

Is regulation of the cosmetics and personal care industry long overdue, or should the market be allowed to be the sole arbiter of what products are in the marketplace? Have you changed products because of concerns about safety of ingredients? If these regulations were put in place, would it change your buying habits?

Tell us in the comments what you think, then use the Take Action button to tell your reps!

— Asha Sanaker

(Photo Credit: Pexels.com / Creative Commons)