Stop this skin Lightening Already

Beautiful black skin

These days, 75% of Nigerian women and between 52% and 67% of Senegalese women use skin lightening products. A survey conducted in South Africa’s administrative capital Pretoria showed that 35% of womenuse them.

Demand is also high in Ghana, Tanzania and Kenya where buoyant economies and advertising have targeted young women of marriageable age. There has been a marked shift in male preferences toward women with light-coloured skin emphasising the idea of “racial capital”.

But skin lighteners are damaging. The World Health Organisation has banned the active ingredients of skin lighteners – a chemical agent called hydroquinone and mercury – from being used in any unregulated skin products.

Unregulated products have significantly higher quantities of hydroquinone and mercury than those recommended by dermatologists. Using them could lead to liver and kidney failureor hyperpigmentation, which is dark skin patches forming on the area where the product is used. There is also a risk of skin cancer because the melanin synthesis which protects the skin against ultraviolet radiation is inhibited by hydroquinone.