Can propylparaben in cosmetics reduce your fertility across generations?

What's actually in it

Propylparaben is a preservative found in body lotions, shampoos, conditioners, makeup, and deodorants. You absorb it through your skin every time you apply these products. During pregnancy, propylparaben crosses the placenta and reaches the developing baby's reproductive system, where egg cells are already forming.

A woman's lifetime supply of eggs forms before she's born. Chemical damage at this stage affects fertility decades later.

What the research says

A 2025 study in Nat Commun exposed pregnant mice to propylparaben and found that their female offspring had diminished ovarian reserves, fewer eggs available for reproduction. But the damage didn't stop there. The offspring's daughters also had reduced egg reserves, despite never being directly exposed.

The effect was transgenerational, meaning the chemical damage to egg cells was passed down through epigenetic changes, modifications to how genes are read without changing the DNA itself. The study traced the mechanism to disrupted DNA methylation patterns in reproductive cells.

This is one of the first studies to show a common cosmetic preservative can affect fertility across multiple generations. Choosing paraben-free personal care products, especially during pregnancy and for young girls, helps protect egg reserves for future generations.