I’m featured in today’s New York Times Skin Deep column, red faced and all, discussing high-end skin care products designed for cancer patients. The article asks are they ethical or just preying on the misfortune of cancer patients, luring them with pretty packaging and promises?
Treatment side effects can range from caustic farts cured by Gas-X to life threatening neutropenia that can land your ass in the hospital for weeks at a time. So when the cure for a side effect like blotchey, rashy, or burnt skin is counteracted by Lindi Skins’s charming facial serum in petite, periwinkle, Swiss spa like packaging, well it makes you feel like a queen instead of a cancer patient.
A 1oz. bottle of Lindi Skin face serum is $40 - the equivalent of two office visit co-pays on my health insurance. Lindi Snider defends the price of her products: “It’s sort of like saying, ‘Why isn’t chemo free?’” Well Lindi that is a freaking fantastic question. Maybe it should be. And do you really want to compare the cost of your product to the inflated price of drugs that are sending families into economic chaos? A Harvard research study found that “every 30 seconds in the United States someone files for bankruptcy in the aftermath of a serious health problem.”
Your face serum feels like silk, but when my free samples are gone, my wallet and my conscience will lead me to my kitchen cupboard for a good homemade olive oil and sugar scrub. Here’s one young adult cancer consumer you cannot sucker with periwinkle packaging.
“Everything Changes is, without doubt, the most forthright, emotionally sophisticated, and plain-old valuable book of its kind I've seen.”
July 18th, 2008 at 2:38 AM
You crack my ass up.