Ingredient Spotlight: All About Aloe

Our Hydrating Hand Sanitizer Hero: Aloe Vera

We’re all familiar with our new normal -- constantly spritzing our hands with our trusty hand sanitizers morning, afternoon and night. Along with all that spritzing can come dry, dehydrated and sometimes even itchy skin. That’s why we’ve created the best clean hand sanitizer that leaves your hands free of germs and bacteria while simultaneously hydrating them! You can be sure your hands stay hydrated AND clean at the same time. How do we do it? Our simple and clean formula uses aloe vera and glycerin to get the hydration job done! Here at OLIKA, we're all about transparency and we know how important it is to be knowledgeable about what ingredients you're putting on your body. So, when it comes to our hand sanis and their ingredients we want to give you an in-depth run-down so you can be totally confident in our products and what goes into them. This week, we’re all about aloe and why it’s the perfect ingredient for a hydrating, moisturizing hand sanitizer to always keep your hands both clean and soft. Sounds like a win-win to us! 

What the heck is Aloe Vera anyway?

Aloe vera has been used as a hydrating & anti-aging ingredient for centuries, dating all the way back to the Ancient Egyptians who referred to it as “the plant of immortality” for it’s moisturizing and anti-aging effects on skin. Even Cleopatra was into it! Today, its uses expand from topical burn ointments to treating rashes to ingredients in beauty products (including hand sanitizer!). You’re probably most familiar with aloe in its gel-like form, similar to what you’d lather on a sunburn.

Now, bear with us while we get into the nitty-gritty anatomy of the plant itself. The aloe plant is actually part of the succulent family, a type of plant with a shallow and intricate root system that allows it to quickly absorb and store water. They have a super unique self-repairing ability, which pretty much means if one of the leaves is cut off, it can seal off the cut using its internal gel. Then, the leaf will continue to grow from the base of the plant with no problem! There’s two parts to every aloe leaf, the inner “gel” and the outer “juice” or “latex.” The latex is what seeps from the leaf when it’s cut, is yellow-ish in color, and bitter to the taste. The gel is the odorless, clear liquid on the inside of the leaf and is what's used for its moisturizing and anti-aging qualities. It’s also what we’re going to focus on and what’s used in all our OLIKA products!

Aloe Vera: What’s all the hype?

Aloe gel is jam packed with vitamins, minerals, and amino acids that make it a fabulous ingredient for effective hand sanitizers. To best understand why it’s used so readily and for such a plethora of purposes let’s break down what exactly it has in store.

Aloe Vitamins

• Vitamin A: crucial for building a strong immune system and bone health. Helps fight off viral or bacterial threats to the body.
• Vitamin C: superhero vitamin that promotes a strong immune system.
• Vitamin E: can protect against heart disease and supports the immune system.
• B1 Vitamin: helps with digestion and a healthy nervous and immune systems.
• B2 Vitamin: provides the body with energy by creating fuel from food.
• B3 Vitamin: helps with high cholesterol, migraines, and diabetes. It also promotes good digestion and cleanses the body of toxins.
• B6 Vitamin: connected to the serotonin and dopamine process.
• B12 Vitamin: necessary for healthy blood cells and helps create DNA.

Aloe Minerals

• Calcium: promotes strong bones and is vital to the cardiovascular and nervous systems.
• Sodium: essential to blood pressure, muscles, and nerves.
• Iron: makes up blood cells and proteins in the body and is also necessary for energy.
• Magnesium: essential for hundreds of processes in the body including blood glucose regulation and maintaining a strong immune system.
• Potassium: protects blood vessels and helps to lower the risk of heart disease.
• Copper: maintains healthy heart functions.

And that’s not the end of it! Aloe vera also contains a unique sugar called acemannan, a type of polysaccharide (a carbohydrate made up of sugar molecules), which stimulates cell growth to help with skin healing and renewal. Aloe is also full of glycoproteins that work to reduce skin inflammation, redness, and itchiness. This unique combination of vitamins, minerals, proteins, and sugars all working together to promote skin health make aloe the perfect ingredient to add to gentle hand sanitizers to counteract the drying qualities of alcohol that work to keep our hands squeaky clean.

Aloe Vera Hand Sanitizer

As you probably know, the key ingredient in hand sanitizer is alcohol since it’s what kills germs and bacteria to keep us healthy and safe. At OLIKA, we use 65% ethyl alcohol, the CDC recommended ingredient and percentage that is the safest to smooth into our precious skin. This is the ingredient responsible for leaving our hands feeling red, itchy, swollen, and dry after constantly dousing our hands in sani. In order to stop our hands from drying out, aloe vera is needed to counteract this effect with its combo of vitamins, minerals, proteins, and sugars that work to soothe and hydrate our skin. Along with glycerin, OLIKA Hydrating Hand Sanitizers have aloe in them to provide long lasting hydration!

We never want to leave you wondering about what’s in our products, especially when it comes to your skin. Keep on spritzing that aloe hand sanitizer and be confident you’ll stay hydrated, too!

Sources:
https://www.naturalhealers.com/blog/aloe-vera-ultimate-guide/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2763764/
https://www.getthegloss.com/article/aloe-vera-nature-s-skin-soothing-superfood