As a part of FDA’s overall mission to protect public health, the agency has undertaken a project to determine levels of lead in lipstick and in a variety of other cosmetics, and found only trace amounts of lead that are too small to pose a health risk.

Research by the Campaign for Safe Cosmetics and the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has found lead and other toxic metals in a surprising number of lipsticks.

Four hundred of the most popular lipsticks in the US contained trace levels of lead when tested recently, confirming similar results of earlier analyses but on a much wider scale and at higher levels than previously detected.