Some shoppers won’t make a move without checking the Yuka app. With it, you can scan the barcodes on personal care and food packaging to discover their health and safety ratings on a scale of excellent (75 to 100 points) to bad (0 to 25 points). Created by French designers, the app is fully independent, meaning it operates without input or influence from the brands it analyzes. It considers all the ingredients in each product, with a strong focus on additives. Generally, Yuka tends to give products with additives and preservatives a poor rating, while organic ingredients receive excellent scores. Yuka, in a written statement to Air Mail Look, explains that it “does not advise against all products with additives, nor does it automatically favor organic products. Rather, products containing certain additives or controversial ingredients may receive lower ratings when independent scientific evidence indicates possible health risks. “But some experts believe these ratings oversimplify matters and lead consumers to reject perfectly good, safe products. Robert F. Kennedy Jr. has endorsed it, calling it “invaluable,” which might not be entirely reassuring. We asked cosmetic chemist, Javon Ford, to scan and tell.—Linda Wells
The Yuka app treats products in a black-and-white way based on the ingredient list. But that list doesn’t tell you everything about a formula. It doesn’t tell you if the formula actually works or if it’s safe. It doesn’t give you the full picture.
