RUBBER “REDUCERS” ARE FOES OF COMFORT BUT NOT OF FAT
In the craze for reduction which agitated most of the women of the United States during the past few years, many of them undertook all sorts of exercises, diets and the use of all kinds of apparatus to remove what they considered superfluous weight.
Among the most widely advertised articles were corsets and brassières, made of pure gum rubber, which were supposed to be worn next to the skin. It was perhaps the notion of those who promoted these devices that they would squeeze the flesh into a more solid form, perhaps causing the body to eliminate the superfluous matter from inside.
There is not, of course, the slightest scientific reason to believe that such apparatus could do anything of the kind. The chief effect of wearing rubber garments next to the skin is that they prevent perspiration from evaporating. Since the perspiration is rubbed into the skin, it is likely to produce irritation.
Some persons have severe irritation of the skin from contact with the rubber itself. The rubber garment does not increase the sweat, but simply causes it to remain on the surface. Certainly it does not cleanse the skin, but rather tends to make it accumulate deposits of waste products.
The sweat regulates the temperature of the body by evaporation from the surface. It also keeps the skin soft by keeping it moist and well lubricated. Rubber garments prevent evaporation of the sweat, which produces laceration of the skin.
Certainly they cannot in any way aid the lubrication of the skin, since retention of salts and other substances is likely to make it drier and to cover it with crusts.