Before you head out the door each morning, you probably use cosmetic products like shampoo, deodorant and toothpaste. But the regulations that guarantee the safety of those products in the United States haven’t been updated since 1938.
That’s when Congress ushered in the Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act — legislation that brought cosmetics, among other products, under the authority of the U.S. Food and Drug Administration. Whether and how to update the agency’s approach to cosmetic safety is now being considered by the U.S. House Subcommittee on Health.