--- description: Confiscated by Manhattan agents of the Food and Drug Administration this week was a load of 30,000 aluminum-cased lipsticks, sent to the U. S. by the swank Parisian parfumerie, Guerlain, Inc. They... title: Medicine: Lip Poison image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltde093bcdab65f2d0/6988d9b9bc6cfc69913e2a3c/time-logo.jpg?branch=production --- * [U.S.](/section/us/) # Medicine: Lip Poison by [TIME](/author/time/) Jun 26, 1939 4:00 AM CUT by [TIME](/author/time/) Jun 26, 1939 4:00 AM CUT Confiscated by Manhattan agents of the Food and Drug Administration this week was a load of 30,000 aluminum-cased lipsticks, sent to the U. S. by the swank Parisian parfumerie, Guerlain, Inc. They charged: for coloring, the lipsticks contained cadmium and selenium, poisonous chemicals banned in U. S. cosmetics. Cadmium, an element of the zinc family, destroys red blood corpuscles when introduced into the bloodstream (as it might be if rubbed on lips or licked). Selenium, a dark red powder belonging to the sulfur family and found in German, Japanese, Mexican and other soils, is chiefly used for photoelectric cells and ruby-glass danger signals. So far no cases of lipstick poisoning have been pinned on Guerlain, Inc. Government officials let the Frenchmen off lightly, made them promise to treat U. S. lips more tenderly in the future. Medicine: Lip Poison ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/archive/6864578/medicine-lip-poison/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/archive/6864578/medicine-lip-poison/"},"headline":"Medicine: Lip Poison","datePublished":"1939-06-26T04:00:00.000Z","dateModified":"2026-03-13T19:00:35.394Z","description":"Confiscated by Manhattan agents of the Food and Drug Administration this week was a load of 30,000 aluminum-cased lipsticks, sent to the U. S. by the swank Parisian parfumerie, Guerlain, Inc. They...","url":"https://time.com/archive/6864578/medicine-lip-poison/","keywords":[],"thumbnailUrl":"","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"TIME","url":"https://time.com/author/time/"}],"articleSection":"U.S.","image":[],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/section/us/","name":"U.S."}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/archive/6864578/medicine-lip-poison/","name":"Medicine: Lip Poison"}}]}] ```