Nearly half of American women get their nails done at a salon once a month or more.
They say the number one concern when picking a salon is whether it’s clean and sanitary. After all, nail infections from fungus or bacteria can be introduced at a salon, when sharp tools or aggressive filing can open the skin.
But new research says that it’s what’s in the air that we should turn our attention to. In New York, they found, air quality was worse than previously thought.
Researchers in this new study found that throughout the day, concentrations of dangerous chemical spiked repeatedly, spelling danger for workers’ health — raising risk of cancer over time.
To be clear, the study was done with workers in mind — people spending the entire day in the salon over months and years — not customers getting their nails done for a short period and only on occasion.
Here’s what researchers found.
Benzene and other VOCs
Researchers from City University of New York Graduate School of Public Health (CUNY SPH) measured the amount of volatile organic compounds (VOCs) in the air minute-by-minute in five New York City salons.
VOCs are chemical that evaporate into the air — think of smells coming off paint, new carpet, air fresheners, etc. VOCs are a problem in nail salons, where polish, solvents, and acrylics all affect air quality.
The researchers measured concentrations throughout the day, took samples, and modeled how much exposure workers would be getting over time, and how this might affect their health.
Hazardous chemicals like benzene and methacrylates were detected but at low levels. That said, when modeled over lifetime risk, exposures exceeded EPA’s safety benchmarks in multiple scenarios.
Methacrylates — like EMA, the industry standard for soak-off acrylics, MMA, and PMMA — are all associated with acrylic artificial nails.
According to the EPA, methacrylates can be irritating to the eyes, skin, and mucus membranes in the throat and nose, causing respiratory symptoms like coughing and wheezing. This can develop into respiratory issues, and even kill cells in the liver, kidney, brain, spleen, and bone marrow. Some studies suggest it could cause rectal and colon cancer.
Benzene is a known carcinogen, and might be present in some nail products at low levels, authors said. It’s associated with leukemia and other blood cancers. It’s also been shown to suppress immune response and be toxic to the nervous system.
Health conditions outside of cancer were generally outside the benchmark, but the salons with the highest VOC concentrations did exceed it.
A new understanding of exposures
The amount of VOCs in the air varied widely over the course of the day, something that would be missed in overall exposure averages.
“This research shows that traditional air sampling and risk assessment methods don’t tell the whole story for nail salons,” said author A. Michael Ierardi.
“Nail technicians and other salon employees may be exposed to high, intermittent peaks of airborne chemicals throughout the workday, yet the health impacts of those exposures have been underestimated.”
This is important when accurately understanding exposures and risk shape how regulations are created. Authors say that the regulations currently in place were created to protect healthy, non-pregnant and adult men during a standard eight hour shift.
Many people working at nail salons — i.e. women of reproductive age — fall outside this group and could be more sensitive to the health effects of chemicals in the air.
“Recognizing the limitations of existing approaches and methods is an important first step toward better understanding health risks and protecting nail salon workers,” Ierardi said.
