Scents of Trouble : For the Sensitive, Fragrances Can Trigger Problems
Add a heady dose of muguet or C-16 Aldehyde to a mixture of ethyl alcohol and 150 or so secret ingredients. Perhaps a pheromone or two. Mix well, and what do you have?
To some, a fragrant elixir to spritz behind the ear or slather over the body for the scent du jour . (The average person applies 12 aroma products a day.)
But others say the same fragrance may pose a health threat to people who are sensitive or allergic to scents. Reported reactions run from sneezing to loss of concentration, mood changes, even seizures and--with enough exposure--long-term disability.
Scents can be particularly troubling for the nation’s 9.9 million asthmatics.
“You’d never want to stand next to an asthmatic if you’re wearing perfume,” says Eleanor Newhouse, administrator of the Los Angeles chapter of the Asthma & Allergy Foundation of America.
And, millions of Americans are allergic to flowers, plants or natural fragrances, or have chronic rhinitis--an inflammation of the nasal mucous membrane--and may be sensitive to strong odors. People with chemical sensitivities are at risk, as well.
It’s difficult to estimate how many people suffer ill effects from fragrances, says Dr. Harold Nelson of the National Jewish Center for Immunology and Respiratory Medicine in Denver.
“I think it’s only the people with more severe disease that would have problems with perfume or other odors deemed to be pleasant to most people,” says Nelson, a senior staff physician at the center, a leading allergy treatment and research institute.
In short, both Nelson and a spokesperson for the American Academy of Allergy and Immunology say no evidence exists that shows odors can cause ill effects in healthy people. However, medical experts confirm that fragrances can worsen the symptoms of many asthmatics and patients with rhinitis, sometimes triggering an asthma attack.
One Swedish study of 680 patients with asthma or rhinitis, reported in 1987, found 79% irritated by flowers or twigs. Other substances, such as perfumes and tobacco smoke, caused irritation in 98% of the asthmatics and 67% of rhinitis patients.
Spurred especially by fragrances from personal-care products, the scent-sensitive are mobilizing to lobby for stricter government control or are taking the battle directly to the multibillion-dollar fragrance and cosmetic industry.
The 2,000-member National Center for Environmental Health Strategies has written on fragrance issues at the invitation of the President’s Committee on Employment of People with Disabilities. NCEHS distributes a lapel button that reads, “Perfume Pollutes.”
NCEHS coordinator Mary Lamielle compares the anti-fragrance movement to those who fought against secondhand smoke 20 years ago: “It was not a popular concept (then) to not want someone to smoke next to you.”
Denver specialist Nelson points out, however, that unlike secondhand smoke, secondhand scents are not known to adversely affect healthy people.
There are other signs that concerns about fragrance have intensified:
* In 1989, unwanted perfume sprayed on a customer, who was subsequently hospitalized for 11 days in critical condition, cost Bloomingdale’s $75,000 in an out-of-court settlement.
* The Human Ecology Action League, an Atlanta-based organization of people sensitive to scents, received more than 4,000 letters after “Dear Abby” published the group’s letter.
* Just three weeks ago, an environmental group said it would ask the Marin County Board of Supervisors to ban perfumes or fragrances at public meetings in the county. In San Francisco, a city committee is studying the effect of fragrances in public offices and may recommend some regulation.
Beverly Hills real estate broker Marcia Sherwin shows up for work in a designer suit but steers clear of designer fragrances. When exposed to perfumed products, she gets dizzy and suffers debilitating burning in her nose and throat and excruciating headaches.
She was one of many who wrote the Los Angeles Times Magazine when a scented advertisement appeared in a recent issue.
“Whoever thought I would spend part of my adult life sniffing magazines?”she asks, a wry grin on her face. The magazine now earmarks such concerned people for unscented copies. So do many other publications, including People and Time. Some have discontinued aromatic ads altogether.
Sherwin has also alerted stores, “so they won’t send smelly perfume ads along with the bill.” Macy’s, May Co., Saks Fifth Avenue, Neiman Marcus and Nordstrom, among others, routinely separate sensitive people for special consideration.
“I wish some of my associates would be as understanding when I can’t tolerate their perfume,” Sherwin says. “Would you believe one woman actually told me, ‘It’s people like you who make it difficult for people like me who just want to express ourselves.’ ”
She gives the slit-throat gesture and says: “This is a very inconvenient problem.”
Perfumery is a $3.7-billion industry in the United States, with two-thirds of the products aimed specifically at women. In 1987 there were about 800 fragrances on the market made from a palette of about 5,000 aromatic chemicals and 400 natural oils.
A myth persists among habitues of the perfume counter that a designer fragrance costs upwards of $150 an ounce because it contains imported iris or rose.
Actually, about 95% of the mix in most fragrances today is synthetic. This includes celebrity perfumes and colognes as well as the familiar odors of most laundry detergents, baby powder, fabric softener, and even some pesticides. (The aroma chemical Muguet smells like lily-of-the-valley, synthetic C-l6 Aldehyde like strawberry.) Sensitive people report more symptoms from chemical substitutes than from natural ingredients.
Fragrance houses are not required to disclose ingredients on the label or to the Food and Drug Administration.
“It’s not just perfume. After-shave and skin cream can be just as bad,” says Ann Jackson, director of the Los Angeles chapter of the Environmental Health Assn., a support group for people ill from chemical exposure. “And a walk down the detergent aisle at the supermarket, for us, can be a knockout. Literally.”
More than one EHA member has been hospitalized after exposure, she says, and some wear activated charcoal masks to filter out problematic fumes.
John E. Bailey, acting director of the FDA’s Division of Colors and Cosmetics, says: “We are not aware, nor is there any obvious evidence that cosmetics pose significant risk to consumers. Yes, people are injured by products, but when you compare cosmetics to other products the numbers aren’t cause for alarm.”
Yet, he adds, “the concern is that the law does not necessarily allow us to find all the problems that might be out there. The tools simply aren’t there.”
Bailey is referring to the Food, Drug and Cosmetics Act of 1938, under which the agency operates. The 156-page document includes only one page on cosmetics.
U.S. Rep. Ron Wyden (D-Ore.), chairman of the Small Business Subcommittee on Regulation, Business Opportunity and Energy, is working to broaden the law. He cites an Institute of Occupational Safety and Health report that said 884 of the ingredients used in cosmetics have been reported to the government as toxic.
“It’s incredible that the $18-billion cosmetics industry can urge millions of Americans to apply chemicals to their bodies daily and not be held responsible,” he says.
FDA regulations, which do not distinguish fragrance from general cosmetic rules, allow self-policing and voluntary reporting by the cosmetics industry. About 850 cosmetics manufacturers are registered with the FDA, but there are thousands of others. Wyden’s proposal would make registration mandatory for all.
In 1989, 133 of the 850 companies participated in a “Product Experience” program, disclosing 12,915 adverse consumer reactions to 1,513 products. Although the numbers of companies seems low, Bailey says they generally represent the largest companies, and that the industry does a “pretty good job” of regulating itself.
“If there’s anything the industry has to be sensitive to, it’s the need of consumers,” says Craig Warren, director of fragrance science at International Flavors and Fragrance, the world’s largest creator and manufacturer of flavors and scents.
IFF’s Product Safety Assurance Group, says Warren, “adheres to industry standards of safety testing that all fragrance suppliers follow.” These are set by the industry-sponsored International Fragrance Assn., which sets limits on product uses, and Research Institute for Fragrance Materials, a panel “whose primary responsibility is human safety,” he says.
Still, the FDA’s Bailey says he believes cosmetics will come under increased agency scrutiny in the future.
Karen Stevens, vice president of the Bay Area Environmental Health Network, says she’s convinced that perfume can be made safe for scent-sensitive people.
“People complain of the same ones over and over,” she says.
Jackson, of Environmental Health Assn., would like more people to heed the needs of the scent-sensitive: “Paying attention by not wearing synthetically scented products may be protecting their own health as well.”
More people already are buying natural products and learning to accept smelling like themselves. Sales of natural body products went from $134 million in 1988 to $380 million in 1989, according to the National Nutritional Foods Assn.
Although sales of mass-market unscented products are increasing, the FDA’s Bailey cautions that “unscented” on a package does not mean fragrance-free. Fragrance may have been added, perhaps, to mask the smell of raw materials.
