Word Nerd: Sulfates (Or Sulphates, if you are British)

Sodium Laureth Sulfate (SLES) and Sodium Lauryl Sulfate (SLS) are ingredients that clean things and make nice foamy suds. Unless your shampoo, body wash, or toothpaste label exclaims that it is "FREE!" of those particular sulfates, it probably contains them. They are cheap ingredients, and they work.

So what is so bad about them? I like clean things (like teeth and hair) and I also like some nice foamy bubbles to prove to me that my cleaning agents are cleaning. Is it just me, or have we all really convinced ourselves that lather means something is "working"? Would you want to use a shampoo that didn't produce any suds? I think it would be weird. Anyway, back to the investigation...

The good folks at Snopes.com looked into the claims that SLS and SLES are cancer-causing, and came up with ziltch. In fact, they trace the sulfates-cause-cancer scare to a shampoo contamination back in the 1970s that found that some shampoos contained trace amounts of carcinogens. But sulfates were not the culprit, and the two malevolent ingredients have since been removed from shampoo. Now, I'm not as eager as Snopes to get behind the "If the FDA allows the ingredient to be used in personal care products, it must be perfectly safe!" sloganeering, but maybe these sulfates-of-doom have gotten a bad rap. Let's keep reading....  

The main health problems associated with these ingredients are skin/scalp irritation and diarrhea if you ingest too much of it (thus the warning labels on toothpaste). I read elsewhere that they can also promote brittle hair/split ends, which the conspiracy theorist in me bets is a kind of cyclical marketing: The product you use to prevent something actually causes MORE of it, leading you to buy more product... But that's just my ramble.

Skin Deep Cosmetic Safety Database give SLS a 3 out of 10 on the hazard scale, but still lists quite a scary array of possible toxic effects, including: cancer, neurotoxicity, organ system toxicity, skin irritation, and a handful of "lesser or emerging" concerns about this ingredient. Snopes may have determined that sulfates are not related to cancer, but I'll take "One or more in vitro tests on mammalian cells show positive mutation results" as a flag that perhaps they are best avoided.

Skin Deep gives SLES a 4 out of 10 on the hazard scale, with the main concerns being skin irritation and organ system toxicity.

If you decide you'd like to try to avoid SLS and SLES in your home, better start reading labels. I was pretty distressed to discover that even my Tom's of Maine toothpaste has SLS in it. Grr....

According to this page of NaturalHealthCentre.com, there are all kinds of things that contain SLS or SLES:

Soaps
Shampoos
Bubble-baths
Tooth paste
Washing-up liquid / dish soap
Laundry detergent
Children's soaps / shampoos
Stain Remover
Carpet Cleaner
Fabric glue
Body wash
Shave cream
Mascara
Mouthwash
Skin cleanser
Moisture lotion / Moisturiser
Sun Cream

Bottom Line: Sodium Lauryl Sulfate and Sodium Laureth Sulfate may not be foaming you into an early grave. But on the other hand, they may be. For my future purchasing decisions, I'm going to tread lightly, look for low concentrations, and try to avoid it if at all possible.