WARNING – PLEASE READ IF YOU HAVE A PEANUT ALLERGY AND LIKE TO SHMEAR MAKEUP ON YOUR SKIN TO MAKE YOU LOOK AS FLAWLESS AS YOUR PERSONALITY
I am one such an individual, and last night I was super pumped to try this concealer. Out of curiosity I read the ingredients and saw something called arachidyl behenate.
Anything with the root “arachi” such as “arachis oil” is probably peanut related. And, sure enough, I did some research and arachidyl behenate is peanut-derived. Which is the story of how I nearly smushed a deadly food allergen into my skin.
There’s a report here from last year that seems to indicate that some food allergens are neutralized when processed for cosmetics, but I’m not sure that applies for peanuts. And at any rate, they did indicate there was still a risk of a reaction if such proteins weren’t processed properly.
Now, I’m gonna say it outright – I’m not one hundred percent sure that a heavily processed peanut-derived chemical such as arachidyl behenate will cause a reaction. I’ve worn a lot of makeup over the years without checking the ingredients, so I could have easily used a product containing it without knowing. Still, better safe than sorry.
Alternate names for peanut products (anything with the prefix “arachi-” should be considered suspect):
beer nuts, earth nuts, goobers, groundnuts, groundnut oil, hypogaeic acid, katchung oil, mandelonas
A full list can be found here, another cosmetic-specific one here.
Here’s some articles on the subject:
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/11558642
http://www.national-toxic-encephalopathy-foundation.org/peanuts-in-cosmetics/
http://cosmeticsinfo.org/ingredient/hydrogenated-peanut-oil
http://www.ewg.org/skindeep/ingredient/700482/ARACHIS_HYPOGAEA_(PEANUT)_OIL/
Stay safe, guys, and please signal boost for any peanut-allergic followers you might have!
YES THIS IS ACTUALLY VERY IMPORTANT