Hidden dangers of ‘safer’ skincare products

A spike in life-threatening allergies linked to goat’s milk soap and other natural skincare products has sparked a warning from experts.

Goat’s milk soap and other food-based skin care products have been linked to a spike in life-threatening allergies.

Leading allergy experts are calling for stricter warnings on food-based skin care to be considered, after a world-first study found these products can cause life-threatening food allergies in adults with common inflammatory skin conditions.

While skin care products containing edibles are often promoted as “safer” and “more natural”, allergy experts say their findings add to the growing body of evidence that their use for conditions such as eczema, psoriasis and dermatitis, can lead to further lifelong health problems.

Researchers from Royal Melbourne Hospital and University of Melbourne started the study after doctors noticed an increase in patients reporting severe food reactions, including anaphylaxis, after eating goat’s milk products.

On further investigation they found that each of the seven patients tested had previously been using goat’s milk soap.

Skin prick tests have revealed an increase in allergies among those using goat’s milk soap. Picture: Tara Croser.

Each participant was skin prick test-positive to goat’s milk extract and sheep’s milk.

The study, published in the Journal of Clinical and Experimental Allergy, is the first and largest of its kind to link the use of skincare products containing goat’s milk to severe food allergy.

Lead researcher RMH clinical immunologist and allergist, Dr Joseph De Luca said while standard advice from his profession’s peak body, the Australasian Society of Clinical Immunology and Allergy, was that patients with inflammatory skin conditions should not use food-based skin products, their study highlighted the need for better protections.

“A lot of the time people are trying to do the right thing and looking for natural products to help themselves. These products are often marketed to people with sensitive skin, so there probably needs to be a step further of warnings at this point,” Dr De Luca said.
“Our paper is part of growing evidence that putting food-based skin products on inflammatory or inflamed skin risks the development of allergies.

“Whether or not there needs to be regulatory approach is something that needs to be looked at.

“What we know is inflamed skin, like eczema, is different to normal skin. There are lots of inflammatory white blood cells and cells in the skin that are quite angry.

“If you put food on that kind of skin, the theory is the immune system is in an angry mode and recognises the food products as possibility being foreign, and then that develops a generation of food allergy at that point.”