Is sodium laureth sulfate bad for us?

Answer 1

Some people think it might be, but there is no real strong evidence of this. In high concentrations it's a skin and eye irritant in experimental animals; some humans have shown evidence of being susceptible to this after prolonged and repeated exposure. However, it seems to be milder than the related sodium lauryl sulfate, and is commonly found in shampoos and detergents.

Some products which contain SLES have been found to also contain 1,4-dioxane (note: despite the similarity in names, this is not the same thing as the "dioxin" in Agent Orange, which is 2,2',3,3'-tetrachlorodiphenyldioxin), and 1,4-dioxane is a suspected, though not proven, human carcinogen. It's suspected that the process used to make SLES also produces small quantities of the dioxane.