The Natural & Non-prescription Health Products Directorate (NNHPD) has updated entries in the NHPID for several ingredients used in NHPs and NPDs.
In February 2025 the entries for several ingredients were amended on the Cosmetic Ingredient Hotlist (Hotlist) to better mitigate potential risks to health that products containing these ingredients may pose to consumers.
Since the ingredients on the Hotlist and NHPID are now subject to additional requirements or restrictions, the NNHPD will notify licence holders of previously licensed NHPs and NPDs containing these ingredients to remind them of their responsibility to support the safety of the impacted products containing the following ingredients:
- m-cresol and o-cresol: amended based on a review of the available data indicating that these ingredients may affect the central nervous system when used on mucous membranes or when used at higher concentrations.
- Peroxide and peroxide-generating compounds: amended to introduce a maximum permitted concentration for hair products due to risk of skin irritation at high concentrations and indicate that these ingredients are not permitted for use in products intended for application to the genital area due to risk of irritation.
- Retinol and its esters: amended to reduce the maximum concentration permitted for certain products such as body lotions.
We are sharing this information with you as you may receive notifications in the coming weeks where you may be asked to:
- ensure the quantity of the ingredients above are below acceptable limits,
- remove/replace/reduce the ingredient in the products, and/or
- add missing statements to the product licences and labels.
There are approximately 80 product licence holders impacting approximately 140 NHPs and 6 DIN holders impacting approximately 9 NPDs that will be notified of these NHPID changes.
NNHPD has confirmed that these requests will be going out as post-licence request, which gives options to the stakeholder on how they wish to proceed to mitigate the potential risks.
