World Ocean Day: Make a difference with microbead-free beauty

June 08, 2018
Posted by Courtnay Allum-Booth

World Ocean Day

Help us celebrate World Ocean Day by doing your bit to protect our blue planet and go microbead-free! Time to ditch tiny coloured plastic spheres. You find these suspended in scrubs and shower gels. As well as many other toiletries and cosmetics. There was a UK prohibition on the use of microbeads announced at the beginning of the year. A full ban on the sale of certain products containing microbeads will come into force in July. Now's the time to look for some more natural alternatives.

Microbeads

Companies use microbeads in beauty products to help exfoliate the skin. However, once these minute plastic particles rinse away down the sink, they are too small to be picked up in water treatment filters and end up washing out to sea where sea life swallow them. The harmful little synthetic pellets then build up in the digestive system of the fish, eventually killing them. They can also pass toxins up the food chain and into the fish we eat.

As they are non-biodegradable, once microbeads enter into the marine environment they are impossible to remove. Conservationists now estimate that if we continue releasing plastic into the sea at the current rate, measured by weight, there will be more plastic than fish by 2050.*

So it's time to help put a stop to this plastic pollution starting with your very own beauty regime. At Westlab we're dedicated to promoting healthier skin while protecting the world's oceans and have got the perfect alternative to those synthetic skin buffers with our beautifying Salt Scrub and Soaks. Whether you want to detox with Himalayan salt, juniperberry, grapefruit and rosemary; energise with Epsom salt, rose, lime and may chang or want to unwind with relaxing Dead Sea salt, frankincense, bergamot and geranium. Not only will your body be left feeling buffed and silky soft but you will be helping to support our seas and oceans by keeping them plastic-free.

To find out more about what you can do to save the blue planet, visit www.worldoceansday.org/