by Jeroslyn JoVonn
April 24, 2025
The FDA is being referred to as out after years of stalled progress and missed deadlines on banning formaldehyde in hair-straightening merchandise.
A bunch of environmental and public well being organizations united to pen an open letter to the U.S. Meals and Drug Administration (FDA) calling for a direct ban on formaldehyde in hair-straightening merchandise.
The April 15 letter, crafted in partnership between Girls’s Voices for the Earth (WVE) and 41 environmental and public well being organizations nationwide, calls on newly confirmed FDA Commissioner Dr. Marty Makary to behave after years of stalled progress and missed deadlines.
“The FDA’s repeated failures to implement a formaldehyde ban in hair straightening merchandise replicate a broader situation of regulatory inertia that endangers our well being,” WVE Director of Applications Jayla Burton stated in an announcement. “Regulators can not proceed to sideline public well being for bureaucratic delays and finances cuts. The time for motion is now.”
Advocates have urged the FDA to analyze the well being dangers related to formaldehyde in hair-straightening merchandise and smoothing remedies. The harmful carcinogen locations salon employees and shoppers in danger for most cancers, respiratory issues, and extreme allergic reactions. Particularly hairstylists who serve Black and Latina ladies, who current research present face heightened publicity to poisonous VOCs in chemical hair merchandise, placing their well being at critical threat.
The open letter is the WVE’s newest transfer to advocate for the formaldehyde ban. It comes practically 10 years after the group took the FDA to court docket in 2016 for ignoring a six-year-old petition calling on the company to analyze the well being risks of formaldehyde in hair merchandise. Whereas the FDA made guarantees to take motion in April 2024, the company has postponed its proposed motion date 4 instances, with the newest being in March 2025.
The longer the delay, the extra salon employees’ and shoppers’ well being is in danger. However with the FDA lately shedding practically 3,500 FDA workers, the delays on essential issues proceed to go unaddressed.
“Black and Brown ladies have lengthy borne the brunt of poisonous magnificence requirements and the merchandise that include them. The continued delay in banning formaldehyde—a identified carcinogen—isn’t just a regulatory failure, it’s a public well being injustice,” stated Diamond Spratling, founder & govt director of Woman Plus Surroundings. “We urge the FDA to prioritize the lives, well being, and dignity of communities most impacted and transfer swiftly to ban formaldehyde in hair-straightening merchandise as soon as and for all.”
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