Dr. Alicia Franklin

We found chemicals that were associated with cancer, birth defects, and reproductive harm, chemicals like flame retardants, organotin compounds, and phthalates.

phthalates are these chemicals that are known hormone disruptors.

And so phthalates are concerning because we do know in the literature that these chemicals can lead to some outcomes even at low concentrations.

So phthalates are particularly found in plastics.

So we know that you're exposed to them not just for braiding hair.

It could also be the plastics from

any other plastic you're supposed to.

So whether that be the shower curtain, your food packaging to clothing.

So an endocrine disruptor is a chemical or a substance that actually interrupts our hormones and our body's natural processes.

So these are chemicals that in some cases they have very similar chemical structures to our body's natural hormones.

And so sometimes the body will pick up these chemicals thinking that they are a natural hormone.

And it'll essentially get to a point where it's like there's some issue because it's not the chemical that the body actually wants.

These are chemicals that are associated with things like obesity and cancers and different adverse health endpoints.

So it's a plasticizer.

And what something like a phthalate will do to the plastic is allow it to be more malleable, more like, you know, give it that braiding human hair-like effect where it can move a little bit.

And it's not like as soon as you break it, it just shatters.

You know, it breaks and it's brittle.

The one thing that concerns me is if these chemicals migrate from or leach from the hair, we're talking about chronic exposure.

It's not like your makeup where you put it on today and by the end of the day, you're wiping it off, you're washing it off.

Braiding hair, when I braid my hair, I'm not taking it out every night and then putting it back in in the morning.