Hair relaxers came into the spotlight in 2022, when a National Institutes of Health study found that women who frequently used chemical hair straighteners had more than double the risk of uterine cancer compared to non-users. Because Black women are by far the most likely to use relaxers from childhood into adulthood, they also disproportionally suffer the harms.
With that in mind, California lawmakers designed the C.U.R.L. Act (Combating Unsafe ReLaxers) as both a public-health intervention and a matter of racial equity. Lawmakers pointed out that companies such as L’Oreal for decades targeted women with tightly textured hair, while failing to ensure the products were safe.
Under the C.U.R.L. Act, which was introduced in January 2025, California will prohibit the manufacture or sale of hair relaxers containing a list of endocrine-disrupting and carcinogenic ingredients. Enforcement won’t fully kick in until 2030, but the law is finally sending a clear warning to manufacturers: the days of quietly marketing hazardous hair-straightening chemicals — primarily to Black women — are numbered.
By 2030, any hair straighter/relaxer product sold in California cannot intentionally contain:
- Formaldehyde or formaldehyde-releasing preservatives
- Certain parabens
- Phthalates such as DBP and DEHP
- Additional endocrine disruptors and PFAS-family chemicals
Manufacturers will also be required to register relaxer products with the state and verify compliance through laboratory testing approved by the Department of Toxic Substances Control.
Noncompliance may trigger civil penalties, enforcement actions, product seizures, and increased scrutiny from the California Attorney General.
Federal Regulation Failure
It seems like the FDA has fallen by the wayside: its warning letters, limited recalls and failure to ban formaldehyde (its target was April 2024), could not keep up with scientific findings linking key ingredients — including formaldehyde and phthalates — to uterine cancer, breast cancer, fibroids, and fertility problems. Despite the 2022 study, the proposal to ban formaldehyde is shelved: In January 2025, President Trump signed an executive order pausing all federal regulations.
Hair Relaxer Litigation
California’s ban does not resolve the harms already suffered by consumers, but legal experts say it will strengthen product-liability claims, especially for cancers and reproductive injuries linked to long-term relaxer use.
READ MORE HAIR STRAIGHTENER LEGAL NEWS
Currently, hair relaxer manufacturers — including L’Oréal, Strength of Nature, Revlon, and Dabur — are facing thousands of lawsuits nationwide, and complaints are consolidated in multidistrict litigation (MDL) in the Northern District of Illinois. Plaintiffs allege these companies:
- Knew about the health risks and marketed relaxers as safe
- Targeted Black women and children through culture-based messaging
- Failed to warn consumers about carcinogenic ingredients
The C.U.R.L. Act’s full enforcement is four years away, but attorneys say it already puts manufacturers on notice. If these ingredients remain in circulation anywhere, continued exposure could form the basis for future claims of negligence or reckless disregard. And it’s a legislative acknowledgment that many relaxer ingredients are unsafe.
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