Ingredients That Cause Acne Formation
Why You Can Not Get Rid Of Acne…The truth revealed
Battling acne is hard at times. There are an increasing number of us who are now not only battling acne but are also battling wrinkles as well. One of the most important things you can do is to make sure that you are not putting any cosmetics on your skin that are actually contributing to more acne forming. The majority of cosmetics on the market contain ingredients that cause acne to form. These ingredients are not necessarily a problem in a lipid dry skin.
Oleic Acid is one of the biggest contributors to acne. Oleic Acid is also known as Omega 9. It can be syntheticall produced but also occurs in the majority of vegetable oils as well. Omega 9 is a fatty acid but it’s benefits lie in internal use not external use.
Unless the acne sufferer totally eliminates these ingredients from the products they are using they will NEVER get rid of their acne.
The discovery that certain products, including cosmetics were causing acne eruptions became evident during the Second World War. People who were working with polychlorinated hydrocarbons developed comedones similar to that of acne.
In 1968 a procedure was developed which used the rabbit ear was an indicator of the comedogenic abilities of individual ingredients. Applying the ingredients to the rabbits ear led to acne like eruptions on the rabbits ear. It is from this discovery that they were able to identify what ingredients were causing acne.
Below is a list of ingredients that have been shown to cause acne. This is sourced from a scientific paper from Monroe Lanzet, cosmetic chemist. They are the correlation of data from several independent cosmetic manufacturers in the United States.
Vegetable Oils - The majority of vegetable oils are comedogenic to skin. The disappointing thing is that most therapists are not made aware of this, and certainly natural skin care companies are oblivious to it.
Apricot Oil
Coconut Oil
Peach Kernel Oil
Palm Oil
Hemp seed oil
Sweet Almond Oil
Grape seed oil
Rosehip oil
Cocoa Butter
Shea Butter
Corn oil
Cottonseed oil
Meadow foam seed oil
Soybean oil
Wheat germ oil
Olive oil
Caprylic/Capric Tryglyceride
Oleic Acid and its derivatives
Oleic Acid
Oleyl Alcohol
Decyl Oleate
Isodecyl Oleate
Sorbitan Oleate
Botanicals
Algae Extract
Carageenan
Red Algae
Esters – Have a lighter oily feel but are technically not oil. These are used in cosmetics that claim to be oil free. The implication is of course that they are safe for acne prone skins.
Isopropyl Myristate
Isopropyl Palmitate
Isoparaffin C13-14
Isopropyl Linoleate
Isopropyl Lanolate
Isopropyl Isostearate
Myristyl Myristate
Myristyl propionate
Myreth 3 myristate
Butyl Stearate
Isostearyl isostearate
PPG 2 Myristyl propionate
Isocetyl stearate
Emulsifiers and Alcohols
Oleyl Alcohol
Isostearyl Alcohol
Octyl Dodecanol
Isocetyl Alcohol
Cetearyl Alcohol and Ceteareth-20
Glyceryl-3-diisostearate
Polyglyceryl-3-diisostearate
Laureth 4
Laureth 23
Steareth-10
Oleth-3
PPG 5 ceteth 10 phosphate
Glyceryl stearate SE
Trideceth
Fatty Acids and Glycols
Lauric Acid
Isostearic Acid
Hexylene Glycol
Cetyl Acetate
Ethylhexyl palmitate
Isopropyl Isostearate
Isopropyl linolate
Isostearyl isostearate
Stearyl heptanoate
Decyl oleate
You almost feel like you need to carry a dictionary with you to make sure you don’t purchase cosmetics with these ingredients in.
Just because a cosmetic says it is oil free does not make it acne free. Non-comedogenic is also not regulated and anyone can say it and it does not ,mean the product will not give you acne.
Olive Oil Not So Good For The Skin
Olive Oil is often eluded as almost being the holy grail of natural oils. Olive oil is an emollient and does contain Vitamin E and polyphenols. Of all the plant oils Olive Oil one of the few that contains polyphenols. Olive oil is primarily composed of approximately 85% Oleic Acid; 9% Linoleic Acid and 1% Linolenic Acid.
So what? It is full of essential fatty acids you say….
But it isn’t you see… Oleic Acid is also known as Omega 9 and it is not an essential fatty acid. By definition Essential fatty acids can not be made by the body and must come from the diet. Linoleic Acid (Omega 6) and Linolenic Acid (Omega 3) are the essential fatty acids in olive oil. Yet they consist of only 10% of the oil. Over 80% of the fatty acid profile of oil is Oleic Acid….and the problem with this is that Oleic Acid causes ACNE (1)
Oleic acid is classed as a triglyceride. A triglyceride has 3 fatty acids and is attached to a backbone of glycerol. On the surface of your skin triglycerides are hydrolysed (broken down) into free fatty acids and glycerol by the bacteria p.acnes (2). These free fatty acids promote inflammation in the skin and cause acne formation(1) If you have acne your skin already has abundance of inflammatory free fatty acids already, by putting on a cream or oil that contains olive oil you are just creating more free fatty acids and acne.
Applying Olive oil also creates scaly skin and abnormal keratinisation (3). Abnormal keratinisation is the major reason for acne formation. Olive oil has it’s benefits in internal usage rather than external applications.
What is dissappointing is that the rest of the Beauty industry are either unaware of these facts or don’t care. There are many products currently sold including natural that are incredibly flawed. Use of these products is often creating other problems for your skin.
Eclogite ensure we do extensive research before we put any ingredients into our products. Eclogite also don’t malign synthetic ingredients as being evil or bad for you. Yes some synthetics are toxic but not all of them are. We are not into scare mongering tactics. Everything we have to say is based on solid scientific fact.
Eclogite only chooses to use ingredients that don’t have side effects for your skin. Side effects include acne, pigmentation and sensitivity. Yet all you have to do is pick up just about any natural product and it seems they have shoved everything in there but the kitchen sink because it sounds good. When they explain why they have put in certain ingredients their explanation is ambiguous at best.
The oil of choice by the way for acne is sunflower oil…but more on that in another article.
