EcoWaste calls for crackdown on toxic skin products
This is the 25th instance of such Pakistani products being identified by EcoWaste, which are readily available online and even in places like New York markets.
PHILIPPINES – EcoWaste Coalition, a non-profit environmental health and justice organization based in Quezon City, has released a critical alert just before International Women’s Day, cautioning women about hazardous skin-lightening creams laden with excessive mercury, driven largely by colourism pressures.
These products, often marketed aggressively to women, carry profound health dangers for users, their unborn children, and entire households.
Testing by the coalition uncovered shockingly high mercury levels in two creams from Pakistan: Yaz Beauty Cream Double White + Vitamin C at 33,970 parts per million (ppm) and Yaz Gold Beauty Cream Active White + 24K Gold Dust at 29,870 ppm, levels thousands of times above the 1 ppm threshold set by global standards and prohibited under international agreements.
The packaging omits any mercury mention or health cautions, yet boldly claims skin-whitening results in as little as three days.
Prolonged use ravages the kidneys, nervous system, and skin, while interfering with endocrine functions; for pregnant women, mercury easily passes through the placenta, raising risks of miscarriage, stillbirths, early deliveries, and developmental issues in babies such as reduced intelligence and motor skill deficits.
Lactating mothers risk passing it to infants through breast milk, though experts still advocate breastfeeding as the best nourishment option.
The World Health Organization further links chronic exposure to mental health woes like depression, psychotic episodes, and nerve damage.
As users apply these creams, mercury vapors evaporate into the air, seeping into clothing, bedding, and home environments—especially hazardous in homes with poor airflow, exposing spouses, children, and others unwittingly.
Colourism, a bias tracing back to colonial times and perpetuated by media portrayals and beauty marketing, equates lighter skin with attractiveness, professional success, and social prestige, resulting in widespread discrimination, diminished self-worth, psychological distress, and a frantic pursuit of fast-acting solutions.
EcoWaste demands that Pakistan authorities swiftly target manufacturers and distributors, while pressing for stricter worldwide adherence to the Minamata Convention, which outlaws mercury in cosmetics.
National coordinator Aileen Lucero calls for uprooting colourism at its core to reduce demand, urging a Women’s Day celebration of diverse natural skin shades as symbols of cultural pride and personal identity.
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