Today I want to talk about something awkward but necessary: sexual wellbeing. Sexual wellbeing is an extremely important but taboo and under-discussed aspect of physical and psychological health. If you know me in real life, you may want to stop reading around here and detour to the safer waters of sunscreen quantities or exfoliating or hair protectants instead. Or not, …
The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has announced that hand and body washes containing certain antibacterial ingredients can no longer be widely sold (the final rule can be found here, and the consumer update is here). Why have they been banned? The Banned Antibacterial Ingredients In high enough concentrations, antibacterial ingredients kill bacteria either by rupturing their membranes (their …
Toothpaste isn’t a product I’ve ever felt the need to experiment with, since almost every brand looks the same and feels the same to me, so I was intrigued when I saw Lush’s tooth products, which are completely dry – which totally confused me until I remembered that you brush your teeth beside a tap, and saliva exists, so it’ll …
Biotin, also known as vitamin B7 or vitamin H, pops up in every supplement marketed for strengthening hair and nails. Do biotin supplements actually work for brittle nails? The answer is – it depends. Gah! Read on for the gory details… Are you getting enough biotin in your diet? Nutritional supplements generally only make a difference if you’re not getting …
“Drink more water to clear up your skin” is popular common sense advice, but is there any science to back it up? Surprisingly, there wasn’t evidence that drinking more water could improve your skin until very recently! Let’s have a look at what the science says… There’s nothing to back up drinking 2 litres of water a day First off, …
These days we’re all aware that suntans give you both cancer and wrinkles, so fake tan is the colour du jour. This miracle-in-a-can stains the skin brown through an interesting chemical reaction. The outer layer of your skin, made up of dead skin cells, is permanently coloured. The tan wears away as the skin cells come off. Here’s how it …
The news broke recently that nail polish can harm your health (again!). This time, it’s triphenyl phosphate, a chemical used in nail polish to increase flexibility – it’s also used as a fire retardant. It’s a potential endocrine disruptor (“it could make you fat!”), and was found to be increased around seven-fold – or so it was reported. In particular, …
Update (2018-12-05): Since Danny of Mentality Nail Polish has generously sent me a cease and desist for defamation as seen in the comments section, I’d like to interrupt your regularly scheduled programming to clarify (even though I think it’s pretty damn clear already) that the causes of the issues are science-based opinion and speculation. Welcome to every nail polish lover’s …