← What's That Rash?
What's That Rash?
Should you be avoiding perfumes and fragrances?
00:22:15
Once you go looking, you realise there are scents in everything – from skincare to cleaning supplies to candles. And of course, perfume. Are there any implications to our health from taking in natural and synthetic fragrances from all these products? Norman and Tegan sniff out the evidence when it comes to scent, and whether we should be worried. References: The first chemist in history may have been a female perfumer – here’s how the science of scents has changed since - the Conversation A Smelling Trip into the Past: The Influence of Synthetic Materials on the History of Perfumery Health and societal effects from exposure to fragranced consumer products – University of Melbourne Effects by inhalation of abundant fragrances in indoor air – An overview Cleaning at Home and at Work in Relation to Lung Function Decline and Airway Obstruction Cleaning at Home and at Work in Relation to Lung Function Decline and Airway Obstruction Synthetic Endocrine Disruptors in Fragranced Produ...
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- [00:01]
A
This episode is brought to you by.
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Marshalls, where you never have to compromise between quality and price. The buyers of Marshalls hustle hard working to bring you great deals on brand name and designer pieces because Marshalls believes everyone deserves access to the good stuff. Visit a Marshalls store near you or shop online@marshalls.com ABC Listen. Podcasts, radio, news, music, and more. Ever since Beef Wellington became a murder weapon, I've been wondering, what's up with mushrooms. Hello, Anne Jones here from what the Duck. And I'm trying to work out why would fungi be so poisonous that it can kill you? And death caps in particular? Why are you so apparently delicious? What do you want to be eaten or not? To find out, search for what the duck and look for mushrooms. Find it wherever you get your podcasts or on the abc. Listen Apple Norman, so last week I got you to stand up and touch your toes. This week I simply want you to raise your arm, turn your head to the side.
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A
This is what adolescent boys do all the time. Before they spray that it's named after an animal species under their arm.
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B
Yeah. How are you smelling today, Norman?
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A
I'm smelling as sweet as roses, but.
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B
It'S not roses or synthetic roses.
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A
No, there's no roses under my armpits.
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B
Well, no, we don't want that. That's a sign of the plague.
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A
And you have to go back to our what's that rash on deodorants to find out what I do spritz under my arm.
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B
Today's episode is definitely a relative of it. Probably a close blood relative of our deodorant episode. We're talking about fragrances and whether or.
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A
Not there's a health risk. Cause what you're listening to is what's that rash? The show where we answer the health questions that everyone is asking.
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B
So this week's question comes from Holly, who says, I'm a longtime listener. First time caller. I have a question about scents. In particular the perfume slash fragrance slash parfum label that we see on skincare. My apologies. That we see on skincare, makeup soaps, kitchen detergents, synthetic fragrances that we burn in our scented candles. Holly says, I've heard that there may be health consequences of these products with fragrances in them. I'm wondering what the current evidence base is on fragrances in our household items and whether they may be harmful to our health. And she signs off saying, I really enjoy listening to your show. I always look forward to Wednesdays when I can see the new episode label next to what's that rash?
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A
Well, this week it's yours, Holly. All yours.
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B
So, fragrances, we're casting a pretty wide net here with Holly's question. We're talking not just about perfumes, which is. I want to talk so much about perfumes and the history of perfumes, but also just about fragrances in our personal care products, but also cleaning products, candles, everything.
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A
Yeah. The artificial smells that we surround ourselves with. So I'm going to do a spoiler to start with and ask you.
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B
Okay.
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A
Are you worried about this? I mean, do you take any precautions in your own life?
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B
You're outing me as the skeptic, lazy person. No is in a word, no. I don't like a lot of really strong fragrances, but I'm not particularly worried about this in terms of health maybe.
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A
So you're away for a romantic weekend. You don't sort of take 16 scented candles with you around the bath?
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B
I don't mind a scented candle, but I don't like a really full on one. I'm not that sort of. You know, some people like the fragrance reads with like, essential oils.
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A
Yeah, yeah. I'm not that sort of the bottle.
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B
I'm not a. I'm not an incense person. I don't wear perfume, really. But kind of, to Holly's question, I kind of don't feel like I need to, given that so many things that we kind of put on our bodies and in our homes these days are scented. Like, there really is perfume everywhere.
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A
Yeah.
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B
What about you? You a scented candle guy?
- [03:53]
A
No. They're more likely to make me feel ill just psychosomatically than anything else. So I kind of avoid fragrances. I get a bit nervous about them. So I share Holly's concern about whether or not they're doing you any harm. So intuitively I was just avoiding them. So this episode of what's that rash? Is also a journey of discovery for me too. Am I right? Am I wrong? Should I be concerned? Have I missed out on romantic weekends because I don't like scented candles? Bow to find out.
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B
I'm gonna call you out on this. Norman, you say you avoid fragrances, but I happen to know that on a trip to France at least once you have gone to, like a perfume factory.
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A
Oh, yeah, no, this was Grasse, just inland from Cannes, and it's one of the centers of the flower growing area that produces scent. That's right. That produces the scents for or the raw materials for a lot of French perfumes and what they do. It's a bit of a touristy Thing is that in a couple of them you can go as a tourist and spend a morning there creating your own parfum.
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B
Oh my gosh, what did you put in your parfum?
- [04:58]
A
Well, so they have layers of scent. So they have a base layer that goes into almost every perfume and then depending on your preferences, so they give you a whole series of preferences. You then build up this multi layered perfume that complies, if you like, with your personal preferences. So I was kind of thinking about either a male eau de cologne or a Mayo aftershave. And I was also taking into account that I don't really like a lot of perfumes anyway, so I did it and actually had to take a phone call at the same time. So I was mixing it while I was taking a phone call and I get to the end and it's like, you know, something electronically is not working and you press all these buttons and it starts to work and you don't know why. Anyway, I got to the end and the woman who was running it really liked my fragrance and brought in the master perfumier to take it and then realized that my documentation of my perfume left a little bit to be desired.
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B
Oh, le documentation. But you, you're obviously. Can you describe the de parfum that you created?
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A
It was subtle. It was subtle, but really subtle and.
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B
Just like a bottle of water.
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A
Yeah. So I don't like floral or citrusy perfumes. And so it was kind of male biased. And male biased perfumes tend to be a bit musky.
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B
I love that you went there. You're a natural prodigy when it comes to perfuming. And it feels like you're even more qualified for this chat than you've been for any chat that we've ever had before.
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A
That's multi years doing learning medicine, nothing on water in glass.
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B
So the word perfume, do you want to know where it comes from originally?
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A
I do.
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B
It comes from the word fumar, meaning to smoke and through, like per, as in through. So this sort of thing that's come through smoke. And so it makes me think of like an incense or like those old things where you might burn something and release the compounds that way. And the first chemist in history may have actually been a female perfumer.
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A
Really?
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B
So this person was called Tapputi. She was in charge of overseeing the palace in Mesopotamia, basically. So we're looking at 3,000 years ago, which in the scale of human history isn't that long, but in the scale of your lifetime or my lifetime, Norman, a very long time.
- [07:16]
A
Ago. Indeed.
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B
I'm interested to talk about why we like to smell like the things we like to smell like. You mentioned roses before. You mentioned woody, musky, citrusy scents. There's a certain lexicon of fragrances and we associate smelling good with smelling like certain types of things that aren't very human smells at all. But then I can think of lots of other smells in our lives that we love, like the smell of a milky baby or the smell of coffee. And we don't typically put those things in our perfumes or the smell of.
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A
Cut grass before you start sneezing for.
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B
You with the hay fever. But yeah, it's sort of interesting how we've kind of culturally decided what things are appropriate to pretend that we smell like and what things we're not interested in smelling like.
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A
Which goes to one of the. So you can't have one without the other. So if we're going to say, well, there's absolutely no effect of perfumes in people who see, think there's health effects or they get headaches and so on, it's just in their imagination. But the reality is for us to enjoy a fragrance, we're enjoying it in our brain. So the fragrance is getting into our brain and triggering certain pathways in our brain. That's why we're enjoying it.
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B
That is so interesting. And I do feel like odour is an incredibly evocative sense. Anyway, I feel like we're sort of getting slightly off topic.
- [08:34]
A
Well, we're not really, because Holly wants to know about whether or not there's risk. And the anatomy is important here because we're smelling at the top of our nose. It's a very short route into the brain from the olfactory apparatus, as they would say. Technically, it's.
- [08:49]
B
Exactly. So the question was about whether we've got health risks associated with fragrances, especially I think, synthetic fragrances. What I'd love to talk about is I've certainly met over my lifetime many people who say they can't handle strong fragrances. Like it gives them a migraine or they get symptoms that are very unpleasant, that they kind of wear the effects of that for the rest of the day. If they're encountering lots of, you know, someone wearing heavy perfume or someone with very strong smelling like shampoo smell in their hair. There's that on the one hand, this very acute symptoms that some people get. And then there's also this idea of maybe like long term exposure. What do we actually know?
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A
Well, we do know that some people can react to certain fragrances. And develop headaches or develop migraine. And again, it's not a huge stretch to imagine how that's going to happen, because there are all sorts of things that trigger migraine headaches, and scents could be one of them. We'll come back to some of the research in this area, because the research, it doesn't necessarily pan that out. But if you get a migraine from a certain type of perfume, then who's a mere doctor to say you're not? The other thing is respiratory effects. So being exposed to the vapor and fragrances in the air, does that damage your lungs? And when you're studying this, you tend to study occupational groups who are exposed to these chemicals in a much more concentrated form.
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B
And.
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A
And there's a little bit of evidence, particularly when you're talking about industrial fragrances, such as when you're using cleaning products and so on, that people who are exposed to cleaning products, as opposed to perfumes, as such, that they do. And it's very complicated to control for this, controlling for smoking, you know, the environment in which you live, or you're living near diesel fumes and high levels of small particulates, very hard to control for this. But on balance, people acutely exposed to industrial cleaning products do seem to have a reduced functionality of their lungs. So their ability to blow out a large volume of air in a very short space of time appears to be reduced. So there's that question there, but it's more in the industrial area. And then there's cancer. These are volatile compounds or volatile organic compounds. And in theory, they can be carcinogenic, whether they're synthetic or indeed natural. And the jury's out on cancer causation. When it comes to perfumes and fragrances, there's not convincing evidence that even though in theory they could be carcinogenic, that they do indeed cause cancer, particularly in the doses that most of us experience them. Allergies can certainly be a problem with perfumes, particularly if you're using eau de cologne and you're spraying it on your skin. Although there's lots of other things in perfumes that can cause allergies. Some people can get asthma attacks, some people complain of cognitive problems and they smell. They just go a bit vague. And a lot of these, when they actually study them in controlled environments, don't pan out. But again, can you argue against somebody's personal experience?
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B
So I've heard at the chemical level that these are called volatile compounds, whether they're synthetic or not. What does that actually mean?
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A
It means that you have A liquid which turns into a gas, or molecules within that liquid that escape from the liquid very easily and turn into a gas or a vapor and. And that vapour or gas gets into our nose and is experienced as a scent.
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B
In terms of the potential health effects you mentioned before, all of the different. You know, it's sort of theoretical that perhaps these things could cause ill health, even if the data doesn't quite support it. Does it make a difference if something is synthetic or if it's so called naturally occurring, if it's still got a level of volatility to it?
- [12:40]
A
This is where there's a lot of debate. So, for example, there are things that could be added to scents like phthalates, which some people believe could be carcinogenic, or they could be endocrine disruptors. And when you use the term endocrine disruptor, it usually means guns at 10 paces, thinking that it's all bullshit and people think there's something to it or a lot to it. But what we're talking about here are compounds that imitate hormones in our body. Not just our sex hormones or our reproductive hormones, but other hormones in our body, which is to some extent relatively uncontrovers. Because if you take in a scent and it changes your brain, that's almost certainly interrupting a neural pathway where chemicals are involved and the chemicals are imitating other chemicals in that pathway. So there's little doubt that you can get an effect there. Some of these artificial chemicals. So there's an aldehyde group which is related to alcohol, and there are various chemical structures of aldehydes which imitate. So the synthetic scent industry has worked out how to recreate synthetically the smell of an apple, the smell of a tangerine, the smell of a lemon. Because it's synthetic, does it mean it's more dangerous? Maybe, maybe not. Nobody really understands that. And then there's the therapeutic side of these things. You can have it both ways and say, well, it has no effect on your brain, when we know that there probably are effects. I mean, lavender is thought to enhance sleep, and there is some evidence to back that up. And then there's a WHO aromatherapy industry, which is for another watch that rash. But again, it's that other side of scents. You can't have it both ways and say there's no effect when some of these scents do have an effect.
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B
So can we give Holly some guidance based on her question, how worried should she be about fragrances, synthetic and natural, in our everyday lives?
- [14:29]
A
So, based on the best research, which is really occupational groups. If you've got casual use of fragrances, you shouldn't be worried at all. Intense use of fragrances in an industrial setting can probably damage your lungs. The evidence on cancer is light on. And the evidence on headaches is if you find you get a headache to a particular fragrance, then that is real, it's not imaginary. And you should avoid that. Fragrance and skin allergy the same. If you've got a contact allergy there for a particular perfume, you should avoid it. And anybody listening who's got adolescent sons who buy this particular brand of you know what I'm talking about, Norman, Stop.
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B
Beating around the bush. We're going to give a code name. We're going to call it Wildcat Asia.
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A
Good. So everybody knows what I'm talking about. You've got adolescent children, adolescent sons. As a substitute to may I also.
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B
Just say there is a female equivalent of this? Cause I live in a household with adolescent girls and I'm gonna call this one Peruvian Butt Butt.
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A
Peruvian Butt Butt.
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B
If you know, you know.
- [15:35]
A
Okay, fine. And then there's the whole precautionary principle which we talk about all the time on what's that rash, which is if you think something is causing you harm and there's no harm in removing it, then just avoid it.
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B
Good advice, Dr. Norman Swan, and thank you, Holly, for your question. You can send us your questions. Our email address is thatrashbc.net au what's in the mailbag? Well, Norman, we have had a couple of emails in regards to our Butter v Margarine episode. So Kita has written saying, I'm a big fan of your show, longtime listener and I'm often trying to get my partner on the WhatsApp rash trip. Recently he came home and told me he'd listened to the butter versus Margarine episode and was surprised with Norman's interpretations of butter being neutral. So Norman, here is this study that Kita's partner was speaking about. 200,000 participants tracked over a 33 year period that showed that relatively small amounts of butter, like two teaspoons a day when compared to plant oils and plant derived spreads equated to a statistically significant increase in mortality over the 33 year period. They also discussed things like cancer and cardiovascular risk. Kita says, I was surprised to hear this and have since listened to the podcast myself and looked at the peer reviewed study. I found it pretty compelling. I wonder if you came across this in your research and if you had anything to say about their findings, they sign off. You might be able to win over my partner with your answer. So there's the throw down.
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A
So this study does indeed. So what this study shows is, so it's 221,000 adults, three different groups followed through in life and it compares butter intake with plant based oils such as safflower, canola, soybean, corn and olive oil. And what they showed was, particularly with those other plant based oils, a lower risk of mortality amongst us adults. And you know, we're talking about margarine and polyunsaturated fats, but we have in the past talked about canola and the seed oils showing that they are in fact healthy and good for you and certainly reduce the risk of coronary heart disease. So this one does contradict what we were saying about butter being neutral. It was showing a higher rate of total and cancer mortality in three different groups of people. Where I was taking the information from was, and I think I said it on the podcast was if you actually look at a large review of all the studies in the area, you will find studies like this, and I think I said it on the show, which show an increased risk from butter, full fat dairy. But the balance of research overall was showing more studies show no effect of full fat dairy and it was more a study of full fat dairy than butter itself. But you will find studies like this which do increase the risk, which show increased risk from butter and full fat dairy. But the balance seems to be on the neutral side, which is why we went for that view in our podcast.
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B
So you're not going to change your behaviour based on this study, Norman?
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A
No, because I take not very much butter. I think I said that on the show. It's a smear on bread sometimes and it's cooking an egg and the occasional cake recipe. Otherwise I'm taking a lot of olive oil in my diet. So that doesn't change it at all.
- [18:52]
B
Well, Kita, I hope that that helps clear things up in your household and that the thing I care about most, apart from your and your partner's ongoing health, is that your partner starts listening to WhatsApp rash regularly. So hopefully that's clinched that one for us. Another email has come from Karen who says, I must declare I long preferred butter due to its better taste and the fact that it undergoes less manufacturing. But with my cholesterol creeping up, I somehow ended up with a part tub of margarine left unused in the fridge. A few years ago I decided to conduct an experiment. The half empty tub of margarine was placed outside in the yard to See how long the contents would take to be consumed or go off. We live on a farm, so it was exposed to a multitude of potential consumers. Farm dogs, cats, kangaroos, possums, rodents, birds, reptiles, bees, wasps, etc. I watched it for several weeks and conducted spot checks regularly for biological activity. I can report that the experiment concluded with the same amount of melted margarine looking just the same as it did at the start. So, from my non controlled, unreplicated scientific study, not adjusted for time of year, atmospheric conditions or brand of product, I continue to believe that butter is definitely the better choice if a dog or ant won't eat it. Is it really a food? Definitely not. A 200,000 participant plus study.
- [20:12]
A
No, it's not. And margarine was invented in order not to go rancid in the environment in the Napoleonic wars. And that's been one of the essential elements of margarine is that you don't necessarily have to put it in the fridge. It will last a long time. And so you have proven that theory. I don't think anybody's tested whether dogs would get into it or not.
- [20:35]
B
I can confirm that dogs will get into butter if it's left unattainable. To my chagrin, I once discovered I'd left some butter out to soften because I was going to make banana bread. My dog, who isn't allowed in the kitchen, went in, managed to eat like so much butter and then, oh no, vomited it on my doormat. It stank. So, yeah, can say dogs will find butter even if they don't find margarine.
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A
And if that story shifts you onto polyunsaturated margarine, it's the intent.
- [21:06]
B
Well, thank you Karen and Kita for the emails. You can send your feedback and your questions to thatrashbc.net au and we love.
- [21:13]
A
Being challenged, so if you've got something that contradicts what we've said, please send it in.
- [21:18]
B
Oh, especially if it contradicts something Norman said. Love that.
- [21:20]
A
Yeah, Tegan never says anything wrong.
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B
We'll see you next week.
- [21:24]
A
See you then.