Methylisothiazolinone and methylchloroisothiazolinone allergy — news, information, safe products, commentary and scientific research
In March of 2019, I came across Ecoleaf Hand Soap, produced and marketed by Suma. The ingredients listed benzisothiazolinone as preservative. Benzisothiazolinone is not approved for use as a preservative in cosmetics in the EU. I wrote to Suma to…
Read more
The Cosmetic Ingredients Review Expert Panel have this year been reviewing the safety of the MCI / MI blend, and have just published their Draft Final Amended Report for Panel Review. It’s a beast of a document — it carries…
Read more
In the couple of years since the tighter restriction on the use of methylchloroisothiazolinone and methylisothiazolinone came into force throughout the European Union, I have occasionally found myself saying “MI and MCI are banned in leave-on products”, and have regularly…
Read more
How hard is it to avoid the isothiazolinone preservatives, do you think? Or indeed, other contact allergens? And is it getting easier, or tougher? A paper just published in the journal Contact Dermatitis — you can read the abstract here…
Read more
Following on from last week’s post, focusing primarily on the European Commission’s weekly alert on unsafe non-food products found to have been on the EU market — which included almost a dozen products containing MI and sometimes MCI — I’ve…
Read more
Isothiazolinone preservatives are turning up in cosmetics in which they should not be turning up. First, in New Zealand, Stuff reported the shocking case of a woman who’d used a cleanser containing benzisothiazolinone (BIT) — which is not permitted for…
Read more
This product may well be ‘Security Protected’ but every one of its ingredients is illegible — obscured by the sticker which has been placed over the listing, almost certainly by the retailer (to whom I complained), not the skincare brand…
Read more
Several papers concerning isothiazolinone preservatives were published in the September 2017 edition of the journal Contact Dermatitis. Abstracts were not made publicly available, but I’ve kindly been sent the full text of one – The importance of a complete declaration…
Read more
It was almost a year ago to the day that we reported on the most recent restriction on the use of methylisothiazolinone in cosmetics in the EU — to ban the use of MI in leave-on cosmetics — and now…
Read more
The standard of health journalism in the media varies widely. Sometimes it’s excellent; sometimes it’s poor; occasionally it’s a health risk. As a health writer myself, I know I’ve made mistakes, and when I’ve done so I’ve tried to put it…
Read more
Please read the About and Privacy Policy pages before using this site. By continuing, you agree to the use of cookies. Some links on MI Free are affiliated. more information
The cookie settings on this website are set to "allow cookies" to give you the best browsing experience possible. If you continue to use this website without changing your cookie settings or you click "Accept" below then you are consenting to this.