CVS to remove harmful chemicals from house-branded cosmetics

SAN FRANCISCO CVS Caremark has announced that it will remove chemicals linked to adverse health outcomes from its house-branded products and will replace them with safer alternatives. The company will also urge its manufacturing partners to take similar action.

The new cosmetics safety policy, which marks the first cosmetics safety policy to be released by a major U.S. drug store retailer, is part of CVS Caremark’s first Corporate Social Responsibility report, released earlier this week.

The company will continue to evaluate and improve their house-brand products based on emerging science about the links between cosmetic ingredients and health/environmental risks.

The policy follows letters from the Campaign for Safe Cosmetics to the company and ongoing shareholder resolutions filed by Boston Common Asset Management LLC in 2006 and 2007 and dialogue on cosmetics safety. BCAM carried out its work in collaboration with the Investor Environmental Health Network.

“We welcome the opportunity to work with socially and environmentally conscious companies committed to making and selling safer, healthier products. We strongly support the efforts of CVS Caremark to create and continuously improve its cosmetics safety policy,” stated Lisa Archer, national coordinator of the Campaign for Safe Cosmetics. “We challenge other retailers to join the race to the top in improving cosmetics safety.”

The Campaign for Safe Cosmetics is a national coalition of health and environmental groups.

The CVS report also highlighted the company’s efforts to increase the placement of products made by companies that have signed the Compact for Safe Cosmetics, a pledge signed by close to 1,000 personal care products companies to replace chemicals linked to cancer, birth defects and other health harms with safer alternatives.