J. Cosmet. Sci., 64, 67–72 (January/February 2013) 67 Investigation of parabens in commercial cosmetics for children in Beijing, China PING WANG, JIE LI, HANMEI TIAN, and XIAOJING DING, Beijing Center for Disease Control and Prevention, Beijing 100013, People’s Republic of China. Accepted for publication July 23, 2012. Synopsis Parabens are one of the most common preservatives in cosmetics. Because allergenicity and cytotoxicity po- tential values are major aspects of preservative safety and parabens are xenoestrogens, safety levels of parabens have been restricted in “Hygienic Standard for Cosmetics” (2007 edition) by the Ministry of Public Health of China, and a high-performance liquid chromatography (HPLC) for the simultaneous determination of parabens is recommended. To investigate whether the commonly used parabens in children’s cosmetics were at a safety level, 105 cosmetics for children were randomly purchased from the local market in Beijing and analyzed by the proposed HPLC method. The detection rate of methylparaben was the highest and the next was propylparaben. Among the 105 samples, two or more kinds of parabens were detected in 72 samples with concentrations ranging from 0.02% to 0.75% 18 samples contained one kind of paraben with concentrations ranging from 0.002% to 0.06%. In this study, the contents of parabens in the 105 samples were all below the restricted levels. INTRODUCTION Parabens are preservatives added to cosmetic products for the primary purpose of inhibit- ing the development of microorganisms. Four parabens (methylparaben, ethylparaben, propylparaben, and butylparaben) were the most frequently used preservatives based on the data from the Voluntary Cosmetic Registration Program (1–4). Although the Cos- metic Ingredient Review Expert Panel support the safety of cosmetic products in which paraben preservatives are used (5), experiments have shown that parabens exhibited an estrogen-like property in vivo in an immature rat model, which expanded the current understanding of the potential adverse effects of parabens associated with their estrogen- like activities. Further investigation is needed to elucidate in greater detail the adverse effects of parabens in humans and wildlife (6). Although the endocrine-disrupting bioac- tivity of parabens is weakly estrogenic, exposure to multiple parabens at low concentra- tions may increase their synergistic estrogenic activities in rat pituitary lactosomatotrophic GH3 cells through a progesterone receptor-mediated pathway (7). Taking into account Address all correspondence to Ping Wang at ping_wang@tom.com.

JOURNAL OF COSMETIC SCIENCE 68 parabens potential adverse effects, the Ministry of Public Health of China set safety levels at 0.4% (acid) for monoester and 0.8% (acid) for mixed esters (8). The types and contents of cosmetics preservatives in Guangdong Province, China, have been investigated (3). The contents of methylparaben, propylparaben, and butylparaben were all below the re- stricted levels. However, the concentration of ethylparaben was found to be 2%, which far exceeded the restricted level of 0.4% (3). In contrast, a similar investigation of cosmetics preservatives in Shenzhen City showed that none of the parabens’ content exceeded the restricted levels (4). To the best of our knowledge, no investigation on the contents and parabens frequency in cosmetics for children has been reported in China yet. We believe such an investigation is critical since children are especially vulnerable to parabens’ exposure given their skin characteristics. The aims of this study are twofold: First, to study whether the commonly used four parabens in children’s cosmetics were below safety level, and second, to evaluate the possible exposure of infants and children to parabens from cosmetic products. EXPERIMENTAL SECTION SAMPLES SOURCE A total of 105 children’s cosmetics samples produced from January 2009 to December 2010 were randomly purchased from the local market in Beijing (Table I). All cosmetic samples were divided into two categories: leave-on products, which were applied to the skin and then intended to remain on the skin (cream, lotion, etc.), and rinse-off products, which were washed off immediately after use (shampoo, shower, etc.). DETERMINATION METHOD Parabens were determined by the recommended high-performance liquid chromatogra- phy (HPLC) method (5). Table I Investigated Cosmetics and the Geological Distribution of the Manufacturers Country or district Leave-on products Rinse-off products Total Beijing 24 11 35 Shanghai 23 8 31 Tianjin 8 3 11 Guangdong 9 2 11 Zhejiang 3 — 3 Fujian — 2 2 America 1 9 10 France 1 — 1 Australia 1 — 1 Total 70 35 105