Gluten free cosmetics and toiletries: an ongoing issue

I have, at last, finished my article on gluten-free skincare products for SkinsMatter.com – please do go read it on the site here, if you can, before you read this post.

It’s taken me most of the year to put this one to bed – and poor Michelle, editor of FoodsMatter.com and all other sites in the Matter family, including ‘Skins’, has been more than patient. I’m sure some of you will have seen previous requests for information, sources, contacts and so on, perhaps through my Twitter feed – and I’d like to extend thanks to all of you who’ve gotten in touch with tips.

It was a tough piece to write. There were times when I couldn’t quite face the difficulties of the research, or get my head around the various degrees of opinion coeliac experts and commentators and sufferers were expressing. No two people shared an identical view, and there was not much science to rely on. I did a lot of Googling, and online reading, and the depth of confusion on the subject – even among those under the impression they knew what they were talking about – seemed substantial.

In the absence of definitive evidence, I learned, most careful and aware coeliacs seem to play completely safe. And who can blame them? But from what we know, and as the article states, it seems unlikely that gluten can cross the skin barrier: it’s just too big a molecule. (Although that doesn’t mean it’s not a problem, either elsewhere, or in other ways… )

It’s easy to jump to the conclusion, if you know you react to gluten, of it being the probable culprit of any reaction. But just like when you experience diarrhoea or tummy troubles it may not necessarily mean you’ve been glutened – we all, coeliacs and non-coeliacs alike, experience those symptoms from time to time, and there can be lots of reasons for them – similarly, if you experience a reaction to a skincare product, which again we’re all prone to occasionally, it may not be gluten. As individuals, there’s just no way of knowing for sure.

(I know, I know – coeliacs often tell me that the tell tale signs of a glutening are so distinct and specific that they’re unmistakeable with anything else, and I don’t doubt this is often the case. But as I covered in my book, Coeliac Disease: what you need to know, there can be other reasons for glutening-like symptoms, and I do consider it important to be open minded about them because that fear of being glutened that coeliacs carry with them, day in, day out, is such an unpleasant burden, that other possibilities should always be pursued.)

Not everyone will agree with the view that you can’t know, or with everything in the article, I guess, and I’d really very much welcome your thoughts here or on the FoodsMatter.com Forum where I’ve posted on this subject.

There is definitely some way to go, but that the German Coeliac Society is looking at gluten-free skincare is surely a positive sign for coeliacs. Personally, I’m interested in exploring more deeply how wheat and oat-based cosmetics ingredients are processed and used, and hope to come back to this one day. The whole issue of labelling is incredibly complex, and this is something I’ll return to too – perhaps when I’ve recovered from writing this piece!

Finally, if you do know of entirely (and I do mean 100% – ie every product) gluten-free skincare companies which fall within our remit on the site, please do let me know. I was a little surprised, despite lots of mailshots, callouts and publicity, that so few companies got back to me about their GF status. You can see the list on the article itself, and we do hope to add to it in future, but it does seem perhaps this remains a very niche area of awareness. It’ll be interesting to see how it grows and develops.

Gluten-free Skincare on the SkinsMatter.com site and CoeliacsMatter.com site.