Why is there so much hype about charcoal all over the beauty society lately? You can find it everywhere, sometimes in face masks and pore strips, toothpaste, and deodorant, and sometimes you can even find it in coffee; it has become so mainstream you can even find it in Walmart.
What Is Activated Charcoal?
While going through various beauty products, you must have found activated charcoal many times listed as an ingredient. Making activated charcoal involves processing material with a high level of carbon and at a very high temperature. Its internal structure changes, and due to that, its pores’ size reduces and increases the surface area. Then charcoal can activate with hot air or steam, and by the increased surface area, it is easy to bind and absorb any kind of liquids and gases. Ingredients for charcoal can be wood, fruit pits, bones, coconut shells, nutshells, and paper mill waste.
Its uses include cleaning water pollutants for heavy metals and preventing the gut from absorbing ingested drugs or poison into the bloodstream as it binds the toxin to itself and sweeps itself out of the body. The regular charcoal that we use for barbecue isn’t activated charcoal that we are talking about; they don’t go under the same activation process and contain toxic substances for the human body. They can come from the same materials, but charcoal briquettes are not activated at high temperatures like activated charcoal.
Does The Soap Work?
Now coming back to the main subject, does the charcoal soap deserve so much attention it’s getting; as stated above,
Charcoal is beneficial in these ways:
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- Firming the skin
- Detoxing
- Clearing acne
- Reducing age signs
- Eliminating blemishes
- Great for all skin types
But there’s no strong evidence that is proving these points
It binds impurities and sucks the oils out, but using it as soap might not be beneficial. Research says that it may need more time to contact your skin to work its magic fully. It’s believed that drugstore products might not be as active as they need to be. As the product companies say, activated charcoal provides all these points mentioned above, but there’s little evidence about this to support their claims. Even so, many people claim that they experience charcoal doing its magic on their skin or whatever they are using it for, and it might be true. Although it offers no harm, experts warn against using over-the-counter or non-prescribed activated charcoal in case of a drug overdose.
Is It Safe?
Research proves that using charcoal products is generally safe, but, even so, there’s no impossibility to have an allergic reaction to it. It’s always a better idea to take a sample of the product and see if it suits your skin or not.
It’s common to use it in medical emergencies and taken orally, and the side effects are rare and mostly have a nauseous after development, nothing more than that.
It has an undeniable desire for vitamins and minerals, resulting in its binding to them and removing them from the body, making it not safe as vitamins and minerals are necessities to the human body. You should take advice from your physician before taking activated charcoal orally.
The bottom line
All in all, charcoal can do great wonders. Still, it might not be that great in practice since there is no evidence of charcoal being beneficial, but that does not mean that all the hype is overrated. Many people say that charcoal did wonders for them, and as there’s no possible harmful side effect noted for charcoal product users, then there’s no harm in trying. It might do something amazing with your skin that might not have been for others.
