Is benzene in benzoyl peroxide a cancer risk?

fingertips benzoyl peroxide

There’s been a lot of stories about benzene contamination in personal care products over the last 4 years. This year, benzene was discovered in benzoyl peroxide, a staple acne treatment. How concerned should we be?  Petition and original paper I’ve written about the background behind Valisure’s benzene analyses before, as well as questions about the accuracy of their data and …

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How to dry your hair, according to science

how to dry your hair science

What’s the best way to dry your hair, according to science? Is it hair dryers, hair straighteners, towels, or just leaving it to dry naturally? I have fragile, expensively damaged hair and try a lot of hair products, so I have a special interest in this. Here’s the science of drying your hair. The video is here, keep scrolling for …

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Red flags for unreliable sources: a guide

red flags for questionable sources

How do you check if information is reliable? One shortcut that works well (most of the time) is to check if the source itself is reliable! This is much faster and easier than trying to learn the science behind an area you’re not already familiar with – it takes a lot of time to properly factcheck information, even for experts. …

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Benzene in your products, Part 2: The story of Valisure

Bunick confusion

Here’s Part 2 of our deep dive into benzene contamination in your products. In Part 1, we talked about whether the experiments were “realistic” (no), and whether the cancer risk was described accurately (also no). This time, we’ll be discussing the wider issues around the private lab behind these findings, Valisure. This is adapted from the video version (which works …

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Does rosemary oil work for hair growth? The science

rosemary oil hair loss

Is rosemary oil a natural, science-backed treatment for hair growth?  According to a lot of doctors, scientists and trichologists across the internet, yes – there’s “scientific proof” that it works as well as minoxidil. But unfortunately, that isn’t true. It all seems to be a misunderstanding of a single study: Rosemary oil vs minoxidil 2% for the treatment of androgenetic …

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