THE 3 REASONS WHY VITAMIN C SERUMS ARE BAD FOR YOUR SKIN


Vitamin C serums have three major disadvantagesVitamin C Crystals

One of the most common questions I get asked by customers is, "when is OUMERE going to make a vitamin C serum?" To which my answer always, without faltering, is: Never.

I'm an outsider of the traditional skin care industry because I do not have a background in business, my background is in biology. I am looking at skin care from a biological standpoint, and not from a marketing one. When I look at things from the biological viewpoint, I am primarily concerned with alleviating skin maladies (caused by skin care) and making skin its healthiest using ingredients that are safe, scientific, and effective.

The insouciance towards marketing is the reason why I don't use argan oil in my products. It’s not that argan oil is bad, it’s just not good enough to put in a skin care formula where space is limited and results are important. 

Are Vitamin C serums really necessary?

In a previous post on ingredient red flags, I mentioned that the best way to delineate between a true anti-aging skin care company, and one that is just out for your cash (at the additional cost of your skin's health) is to look at the ingredients. If a self-proclaimed anti-aging line contains cytotoxic agents like essential oils, then they are not motivated by consumer health and wellbeing, they are just a marketing company with a product to sell. Furthermore, you as the consumer need to do your research because in order to have a trustworthy line, all of their ingredients in all of their products need to be safe. Therefore, if one product out of 50 in a brand's line contain essential oils, cayenne pepper, or any other damaging ingredients, then the line is not trustworthy and doesn’t deserve your hard-earned money.

I've sat in on quite a few meetings with skin care giants during the process of picking a product, and they are all the same. First, let me tell you what does not happen. What doesn’t happen is a bunch of biologists and associated scientists with profound knowledge on skin care and health pour through countless published studies, weighing the pros and cons of each ingredient, go through countless experiments and human testing, and after several years formulate a product based on their sound results, and then bring it to the head of a company to sign off on.

What really happens is a group of businesspeople, marketers, and advertisers sit in a room, and this panel debates ingredients to put in their latest product based on the trendiest buzzwords and marketable content in the industry at the moment. They send that list of ingredients to a chemist (with likely no knowledge beyond intermediate college biology) who makes a cream/serum/cleanser that contains maybe 1-5% of those ingredients, and 95-99% filler (thickeners, harsh solvents, preservatives, emulsifiers, etc). That chemist is given certain priorities by the higher-ups: feel, smell, appearance. None of which translates to skin health but rather to marketability. That product (and a few alternatives) is taken to the heads of the company, they try it out few out for a few days or a week, send the final pick to mass-production, and then you get your final product on store shelves.

It is for the very reason highlighted above: marketing, scientists with no advanced knowledge of biology but are rather acting as "cooks in the kitchen", and companies driven by sales is why every major brand on the market has a vitamin C serum.

OUMERE doesn't make a vitamin C serum, and here are the reasons why.


1. Vitamin C serum can and will act as a pro-oxidant, causing skin damage

 

Ever notice that vitamin C serums turn brown after sitting on the shelf for a month? That brown color happened because the serum oxidized, and oxidation occurs in all serums containing vitamin C. Oxidation is a destructive process (this is how rust occurs), and when you put a vitamin C serum on your skin, it will cause oxidation and skin damage. This is due to the pro-oxidant effect of vitamin C in skin care. 

A pro-oxidant is the opposite of an antioxidant. Where an anti-oxidant is a molecule that prevents oxidation of other molecules, and hence protects against the cell-damaging effects of free radical production, a pro-oxidant does the reverse, and induces oxidative stress, either by generating reactive oxygen species or by inhibiting antioxidant systems.

Vitamin C on its own can act as an anti-oxidant. So when you eat foods high in vitamin C, you get the health benefit of the vitamin donating electrons, and thus preventing oxidation of tissue, lipids, protein, and DNA.

Vitamin C's ability to readily donate electrons, and thus acting as an anti-oxidant also means that it readily reacts with other molecules, which has consequences that aren't always good. In the presence of catalytic metals, vitamin C reacts with those metals causing a pro-oxidant effects, specifically, vitamin C reacts with oxygen, producing superoxide that subsequently dismutes to produce harmful by-products such as hydrogen peroxide (H2O2). Furthermore, it requires little vitamin C to have it act as a pro-oxidant, and a lot of vitamin C to act as an anti-oxidant.

The Fenton Reaction causes vitamin C to act as a pro-oxidant
The Fenton Reaction causes vitamin C to act as a pro-oxidant

When vitamin C acts as a pro-oxidant, the consequences include irritation, inflammation, collagen and elastin breakdown, and acne. So if you have any of these skin ailments, and are using a vitamin C serum, then its time to re-think your regimen.

Vitamin C serum can become a pro-oxidant when exposed to atmospheric oxygen, so just by living on Earth you are putting yourself at risk when wearing a Vitamin C serum. Vitamin C can also become a pro-oxidant when in contact with metal. 

Vitamin C's propensity to become a pro-oxidant when in contact with metal is concerning from a skin-care standpoint because the metals vitamin C react with are metals our skin encounters often. When vitamin C encounters iron a biological reaction, known as the Fenton reaction, is initiated. The Fenton reaction is the pivotal reaction in the oxidation of membrane lipids and amino acids, and in the reactions where biological reduction agents are present, such as vitamin C. Our skin comes into contact with iron every day. According to the FDA, iron is a significant pollutant in the air and in the water, and from recent research from the University of Birmingham: "Human activities may have led to an increase of atmospherically soluble iron in the oceans by several times since the Industrial Revolution."

There is also iron and other metals in makeup and sunscreen, which can further compound the oxidizing effect of vitamin C serums.

When we topically apply vitamin C to our skin, and our skin comes in contact with the air, which contains iron due to pollution, we are inviting a pro-oxidant reaction to occur. It is also safe to assume that since water contains iron contaminants, in general, that much of the water used in your skin care contains iron too. There is no way around iron pollution coming in contact with your skin. Your best safeguard to minimize harm is to avoid molecules that interact with iron to form damaging pro-oxidants.

How to fix the oxidative damage vitamin C serums caused

A majority of customers who have come to us with damaged skin, including acne, redness and bacterial issues had one thing in common: The use of vitamin C serums. 

If your skin has been inflamed from use of vitamin C serums due to their oxidizing effect, the solution is the following:

First,  stop using vitamin C serums.

Give your skin a one week break and then follow an anti-inflammatory skin care regimen.

OUMERE products do not contain any ingredients that would cause oxidation to the skin, which is why our products act as anti-inflammatory agents and have been reported to reduce redness, inflammation and improve the signs of rosacea and other inflammatory skin ailments. 

I advise just using the UV-R serum for a couple days because its high concentration of anti-inflammatory extracts will calm you skin down and reverse the oxidative damage caused by the vitamin C serums. After your skin looks like it has improved, follow the following routine:

AM:

No. 9, (dilute for damaged skin) To rebuild, repair and strengthen skin, including collagen

UV-R for anti-inflammation and hydration. Inflammation breaks down collagen, and use of UV-R protects your body's collagen in the long-term, preserving skin's youthful appearance.

Serum Bioluminelle for balancing skin's oils, anti-aging and locking in hydration, which is key for maintaining skin's structural integrity and preventing damage.

PM:

Oil Dissolution Theory- To cleanse without damaging the skin, and keeping hydration

UV-R for anti-inflammation and hydration

Serum Bioluminelle 

 

 


2. Vitamin C reacts with common compounds found in cosmetics.

Adding onto point #1, we can say that many compounds found in cosmetics are further eliciting vitamin C to become a pro-oxidant. Let’s, for the sake of brevity, just take 3 common ingredients found in cosmetics:

1. EDTA

EDTA is a common preservative used in food, household cleaners, laboratory specimens, and in cosmetics. EDTA contains 9.7-19.4 uM of iron per 50mM sample, which is enough to elicit the Fenton reaction described above.

Do not mix your vitamin C serum with EDTA
DTA prevents blood from coagulating, and is used to preserve to laboratory specimens.

2. Copper

Copper is another ingredient that has generated a lot of buzz as of late because of research that has found some anti-aging effects when topically applied. The concern with combining copper and vitamin C is greater (by some research) than combining iron with vitamin C. From Buettner and Jurkiewicz:

“But because copper is -80 times more efficient as a catalyst for ascorbate oxidation than iron, in typical phosphate buffers it is the adventitious copper that is the biggest culprit in catalyzing ascorbate oxidation.”

So although copper is not something you are likely to encounter every day in terms of environmental contaminants, the likelihood of it being in your cosmetics (including skin care) is becoming greater due to it’s increasing popularity as an anti-aging ingredient. And this is cause for concern given that it has a stronger effect on turning vitamin C into a pro-oxidant than iron.

3. Phosphates

Phosphates are everywhere in cosmetics, from haircare, to foundations and primers, to cleansers, and have a multitude of functions, including balancing the pH of a formula, emulsifying water and oil ingredients, and enhancing the lathering effect of a product. On their own they are fairly harmless, although for some they can be drying to the skin and hair. However, phosphates contain both trace sources of iron and copper, both of which elicit a pro-oxidant reaction from vitamin C.

Do not mix your vitamin C serum with phosphates
Getting vitamin C from food is your best bet for optimal skin health

3. VItamin C serums do not make collagen, they deplete it  

I think the lie with vitamin C is that it somehow upregulates collagen in the skin. If you put it on your skin then somehow a skin cell is signaled to create collagen. What I don’t understand is that since vitamin C does not signal collagen to be made during normal biological development, why is skin care able to cause the body to do something it wasn’t capable of doing before? 

It can’t. In a body, like yours, vitamin C is involved with in the process of collagen synthesis but it’s involvement doesn’t take place until after the collagen protein is already made, once made vitamin C shapes the collagen protein a bit to aid in its function. If you were baking a cake, collagen is like the knife cutting the slice of cake. The knife gave the slice that shape so you could eat it. The knife did not make the cake itself and is not involved in making more cake. On its own a knife cannot make a cake.

I believe that the falsehood of vitamin c topically applied to the skin can cause a cell to secrete collagen in an anti-aging way is the result of non-scientists having a platform on the internet and social media.

However, there is one point to be made: I do believe vitamin C serums can stress the cells out enough that they secrete a hardening type of collagen called scar tissue collagen.

Vitamin C serums disrupt the normal functioning of your body by causing the breakdown of the bacterial biome, increasing inflammation and the disruption of normal cell functioning. Among many problems, this will cause the cells to be stressed, and when cells are stressed, they act abnormally. One thing skin cells do during a stress response is release collagen, but this is not the kind of collagen you want. The collagen secreted by cells during a stress response is scar tissue collagen, which causes the skin to become rough, hard and aged over time. When scar tissue forms, this prevents new healthy cells from anchoring into the correct place, and this means new skin cannot form, and new healthy collagen cannot form.

So when you use vitamin C serums, if any collagen is made, it is from a stress response in the body, which leads to aged skin over time. This is why a scar forms, because the surrounding cells released scar tissue collagen, which prevents new skin cells from forming, and thus a scar stays there forever.

When you use vitamin C serums, it is rolling the dice with your health. And you are causing a stress response in the body, which will prevent your skin from being healthy and young in the long term. 

The only way to safely boost collagen in the body is by preserving the collagen you have, and this is done through healthy lifestyle choices and proper skin care. Preserving collagen is also means avoiding damaging measures such as chemical peels, dermarollers, and harsh skin care. 

 

My conclusion from vitamin C serums is that they are the product of viral marketing, and are a gimmick at best and a cytotoxic agent at their worst. Why risk your skin’s health for something that we will probably all cradle our face in our hands 20 years from now at the very thought of using? If you are concerned about collagen growth, use a daily chemical exfoliant. If you are just looking for a proper skin care regimen, then just use a serum that has been heavily researched with a balance of healthy oils and extracts. And my final word is that skin care is just like every other industry out there, and every industry is just looking for the latest and greatest way to take your money. Today it’s vitamin C, tomorrow, who knows.

 

** Bonus **

 


4.  Vitamin C Serums Cause Acne in Healthy Skin

Read the full article here

 

Follow Up Articles:

 

The Scientific Papers Supporting Vitamin C Serum's Skin Benefits Are Flawed 

 


References:

Buettner, G. R., & Jurkiewicz, B. A. (1996). Catalytic metals, ascorbate and free radicals: combinations to avoid. Radiation research, 145(5), 532-541. Chicago.

Ceolin, V., Ghia, C. (2014). The Fenton Reaction: pro-oxydant role of vitamin C. <http://flipper.diff.org/app/pathways/6861> Accessed November 30, 2017.

Chen, C., Fan, S., Li, C., Chong, Y., Tian, X., Zheng, J., ... & Yin, J. J. (2016). Platinum nanoparticles inhibit antioxidant effects of vitamin C via ascorbate oxidase-mimetic activity. Journal of Materials Chemistry B4(48), 7895-7901.

du Vivier, A., & Stoughton, R. B. (1975). Tachyphylaxis to the action of topically applied corticosteroids. Archives of Dermatology, 111(5), 581-583.

Puri, P., Nandar, S. K., Kathuria, S., & Ramesh, V. (2017). Effects of air pollution on the skin: A review. Indian Journal of Dermatology, Venereology, and Leprology83(4), 415.

Sullivan, R. J. (1969). Air pollution aspects of iron and its compounds.

Weijun Li, Liang Xu, Xiaohuan Liu, Jianchao Zhang, Yangting Lin, Xiaohong Yao, Huiwang Gao, Daizhou Zhang, Jianmin Chen, Wenxing Wang, Roy M. Harrison, Xiaoye Zhang, Longyi Shao, Pingqing Fu, Athanasios Nenes, Zongbo Shi. Air pollution–aerosol interactions produce more bioavailable iron for ocean ecosystems. Science Advances, 2017; 3 (3): e1601749 DOI: 10.1126/sciadv.1601749