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Health Canada warns us not to use borax for cleaning, in homemade pesticides, and in silly putty and slime type crafts. The amount of borax in any of these things is thousands upon thousands of times more borax than the .025% we use to emulsify beeswax into a cream. We are not even required to declare it on the label - but we do.
In The Truth About Borax In Skincare, Scratch Mommy explains: "Borax is a naturally occurring mineral, also known as “sodium borate, sodium tetra borate, or disodium tetra borate”. It is not to be confused with boric acid; while borax is a salt of boric acid, it is not chemically the same as boric acid. Many articles and studies appear to lump boric acid and borax together, which can make researching their impact somewhat difficult. Borax has similar properties to baking soda, but a higher pH level."
Where the high alkalinity of borax is a concern in skincare, the important thing is the PH of the product as a whole, not of the individual ingredients that are in vastly different quantities in the finished product. For instance, Anarres' deodorant uses baking soda, which is alkaline and would irritate the skin alone, but when combined with the citrus ingredients, it's PH neutral on the skin, which is to say that it's mildly acidic and therefore gentle.
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IS BORAX EVIL?
It's no longer recommended for ingestion as it was in 1900, but it is still sold for cleaning. I sell borax at Anarres Apothecary http://www.anarreshealth.ca/product/sodium-borate-aka-borax-crystals-gram and here I will tell you why.
ON THE USE OF BORAX IN SKINCARE PRODUCTS
In the Environmental Working Group's 2011 article "Boric acid or sodium borate can also be found in personal care products. The cosmetic industry's own safety panel states that these chemicals are unsafe for infant or damaged skin, because they can absorb readily into the body. Despite this guidance, boric acid is found in some diaper creams."
This is going to sound strange coming from me, a virtual purist, but EWG's article has not taken into consideration the use of borax as an emulsifier for beeswax. The percentage used must be less than .5%. In fact, the version of borax that we sell at Anarres has an EWG hazard rating of 0 /10!Health Canada warns us not to use borax for cleaning, in homemade pesticides, and in silly putty and slime type crafts. The amount of borax in any of these things is thousands upon thousands of times more borax than the .025% we use to emulsify beeswax into a cream. We are not even required to declare it on the label - but we do.
In The Truth About Borax In Skincare, Scratch Mommy explains: "Borax is a naturally occurring mineral, also known as “sodium borate, sodium tetra borate, or disodium tetra borate”. It is not to be confused with boric acid; while borax is a salt of boric acid, it is not chemically the same as boric acid. Many articles and studies appear to lump boric acid and borax together, which can make researching their impact somewhat difficult. Borax has similar properties to baking soda, but a higher pH level."
Where the high alkalinity of borax is a concern in skincare, the important thing is the PH of the product as a whole, not of the individual ingredients that are in vastly different quantities in the finished product. For instance, Anarres' deodorant http://www.anarreshealth.ca/product/deodorant-detoxifying-cream uses baking soda, which is alkaline and would irritate the skin alone, but when combined with the citrus ingredients, it's PH neutral on the skin, which is to say that it's mildly acidic and therefore gentle.