Fragrances are designed to make you smell good, but is that all they are doing? In a recently released study of 17 name-brand fragrances co-authored by EWG and the Campaign for Safe Cosmetics, we found that they contain secret ingredients, chemicals not listed on the label, with troubling hazardous properties.
We found 38 unlisted chemicals in our testing. The average fragrance tested contained 14 secret chemicals. Among them are chemicals associated with hormone disruption and allergic reactions, and many substances that have not been assessed for safety in personal care products by the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) or the industry's own safety panel.