The PAAG furore rages on. Concern has been raised over the reported presence of PAAG in a wide range of cosmetic and personal care products.
The Consumer Council has followed up on this concern and, much to everyone's relief, found no evidence that such products pose a health hazard to users.
In fact, these products do not contain PAAG but a chemical called polyacrylamide (PAM or PAA) which is used as an ingredient of PAAG.
In cosmetic formulations, PAM is added to serve as stabilizer, foam builder, binder, film former, anti-static agent and hair fixative.
PAM is used also in many other applications - drinking water and wastewater treatment, oil recovery, fabric and paper processing, ore processing, grouts making and soil conditioning agent.
PAM in itself is non-toxic. But acrylamide monomer, which may be left behind in the production process of PAM, is a neurotoxin and classified by the International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC) as "probably carcinogenic to humans".
Insofar as information collected by the Council is concerned, there is no evidence of proof that the presence of PAM in cosmetic and personal care products pose a risk to health.
In 1999, the Scientific Committee on Cosmetic Products and Non-Food Products (SCCNFP) drew the conclusion that the long-term use of PAM-containing cosmetics should not pose a significant cancer risk if the monomer content is within limit.
In 2002, based on the summary risk assessment of acrylamide, the European Commission (EC) also concluded that the risk of mutagenicity (mutation of cells) and carcinogenicity caused by using PAM-containing cosmetics is considered to be very low.
According to the EC Cosmetic Directive (76/768/EEC), the maximum residual acrylamide content in body-care leave-on products and other cosmetic products should not exceed 0.1 mg/kg and 0.5 mg/kg respectively.
It should be noted that the effect of acrylamide monomer to health depends on the dosage and duration of exposure. Therefore, the injection of PAAG for beast augmentation, and the use of PAM-containing cosmetic and personal care products are two completely different scenarios and hence of different risks.
The Customs and Excise Department is understood to have planned to investigate the acrylamide monomer content in various cosmetic products on the market.
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