Skin lightening creams: the toxic ‘beauty’ secret on UK high streets

Illegal skin-lightening products are still on sale in a wide range of UK outlets, including grocery stores, specialist food shops and even butcher’s, say trading standards officers.

The Chartered Trading Standards Institute is urging consumers to avoid these harmful creams, oils, lotions and serums, and report the shops and online retailers that continue to sell them.

‘Invisible’ health hazards

Skin-lightening creams containing certain dangerous ingredients were banned in the UK and the EU in 2001 because of the skin damage and health issues these ingredients can cause. Yet enforcement has turned into a game of whack-a-mole for authorities: as quickly as illicit products are seized, new stock appears. One South London retailer was fined £30,000 after twice being caught stocking banned skin-lightening products, said The Voice.

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Illicit products generally are “not labelled with mandatory safety or traceability information, a sign they may contain banned substances”. These include hydroquinone, a prescription-only compound that, used without medical oversight, can cause irritation and eye damage and, once absorbed into the bloodstream, may “overload the liver and kidneys”, said Chemistry World. Another common ingredient, mercury, can cause high blood pressure, rapid weight gain, renal damage and “can even be transferred to infants through breastmilk, carrying silent, long-term health risks’. Many of the most serious health impacts of these products are “invisible” at first, so consumers “underestimate the danger” – until it is too late.

‘Shaped by colourism’

The illicit UK skin-lightening market is just part of what The McGill International Review calls a “thriving, multi-billion-dollar industry”. Women of colour account for “approximately 80%” of sales of legal skin-lightening products worldwide, all trading on the notion that “lighter skin is worth chasing – no matter the cost”.

Use of these creams “not a new phenomenon”, and dates back to the “colonial belief that lighter skin conferred greater worth”, said The Guardian. Even now, the myth “seems to endure” for women of colour across the globe. In this context, skin-lightening creams are not merely cosmetics but tools of supposed self-improvement to meet “beauty ideals shaped by colourism”.

Hoardings advertising skin-lightening products and featuring “images of white or lighter-skinned black women” are a common sight across African cities, said NPR. Multiple African nations have banned products containing harmful ingredients, and Nigeria declared a state of emergency over the issue in 2023. Even so, the industry continues to boom, with many companies now offering extra-potent “bespoke” lotions said to achieve “specific skin tones”. Some creams are marketed specifically for use on children.

In the UK, authorities insist anyone found selling illicit products will face prosecution. But, as Stylist’s Dahaba Ali Hussen said in 2019, “outlawing something doesn’t necessarily make it any less common; it simply makes it less safe”.