Sally's Rant: EU to Ban Oakmoss?!

Sally’s Rant:

My daughter is allergic to nuts. If she eats them, she could die, which is why she avoids them by checking labels and generally steering clear of them. It’s not a hard thing to do, annoying perhaps sometimes, but just a lifestyle adjustment which is second nature to her, my family and her friends now.

It’s not an uncommon allergy either, thousands of people across the UK alone have to make the same sacrifices because nuts appear in many foods and there are no signs of them being banned anytime soon. However, Oakmoss an, until recently, inoffensive and trouble-less ingredient is to be banned from perfumes as a small percentage of people are reportedly allergic to it. 

That fact baffles me for the following reasons:

1. Oakmoss, to my knowledge, has never killed anyone. However nuts have and they are still used in hundreds of food products.
2. The percentage of people allergic to the oakmoss is miniscule.

Perfumes such as Chanel No.5, Paloma Picasso and Guerlain’s Mitsouko will all have to be reformulated to ensure that the small minority of people with an allergy to Oakmoss won’t be affected. And that’s assuming that they even wear a perfume with Oakmoss in it!

What I’m getting at is simply, how can a perfume ingredient be completely banned for the sake of relieving an allergy which is, so far, very uncommon? If it was a more common allergy then the need to do something would be more urgent but the fact is: it’s not.

Going back to the nut example, people who are allergic to nuts simply read the packaging and make the decision to go without enjoying a particular food if they have to; they learn to live with it. Why should consumers have to miss out on perfumes they once loved and perfumers have to face extra costs reformulating, when this could be resolved by the individuals affected making informed decisions and accepting the fact they can’t use particular perfumes.

As an aside, Citral is also creeping into the spotlight for the same reasons and Frederic Malle, who founded Editions de Parfums Frederic Mall,  has made the same point as us in this quote, “If we ban citral from perfumes, of which certain elements are allergens, we should ban orange juice. It is absurd. We should not ban nature, only learn how to live with it”.

Rant over...

On a happier note, we have searched and found a synthetic oakmoss that we love so your own formulations can still include it. Click here to find out more.

What are your thoughts on this? Is Oakmoss included in any of your favourite perfumes? Let us know in the comments below.