With warm weather finally here, most people wanting to keep fresh will consider applying anti-perspirant or deodorant as an essential part of their morning routine. However, in recent years, these products have been at the centre of controversy.
Antiperspirants, as their name suggests, reduce sweating — the active ingredients work by temporarily plugging the sweat ducts in your armpits. Meanwhile, deodorants mask bad smells with perfume, or eliminate them with antimicrobial agents. If you glance at the back of your spray or the label on your roll on, you’ll be greeted with a large list of synthetic ingredients that seem more suited to the shelves of a laboratory, many of which threaten the environment and human health. With so many synthetic ingredient combinations used in all aspects of our lives, and few long-term studies on their use, the long-term effects they have on our bodies and environment are largely unknown, but the information that does exist paints a bleak picture.