A mother claims her four-year-old son was left with ‘severe burns’ after wearing cheap Halloween face paint she purchased from Woolworths.
Alexandra Leigh Carter, a mother-of-three from Toowoomba, Queensland, painted her son Mckenzie’s face with an AUD $4 makeup kit – but was horrified to find it had left his skin with angry, red marks.
The 28-year-old says her son’s face was covered in a painful, itchy rash after the paint was on his skin for less than 20 minutes.
‘As I was wiping it away I thought it was just the red undertone of the paint, but Mckenzie said it was itchy and hurting him,’ Alexandra told FEMAIL.
A Woolworths spokesperson confirmed to Daily Mail Australia that the product has been available since early October and this is the only incident to date.
Alexandra Leigh Carter, a mother-of-three from Toowoomba, Queensland, painted her son Mckenzie’s (pictured) face with a $4 makeup kit – but was horrified to find it had left his skin with angry, red marks
The 28-year-old says her son’s visage was covered in a painful, itchy rash (pictured) after the paint was on his skin for less than 20 minutes
‘It looked like a chemical burn and the red marks didn’t start to calm down until over an hour after we took it off,’ Alexandra told FEMAIL of the face paint.
‘We did this as a trial run for Halloween and safe to say I’ll never be using face paint again. I’ve had his face painted countless times, though whatever is in this product is horrific.’
Alexandra says she performed a skin-test before applying the paint to her son’s face and there was no adverse reaction.
Distressed, she called the health line and got ready to pack up her younger two children to go to the hospital, before eventually deciding to give him allergy medicine and wait and see if the rash cleared up.
‘Mckenzie looked in the mirror and asked me: “Is it going to stay like this mummy?”‘ Alexandra said.
‘The marks underneath his eyes were the worst because they looked like bruises.’
‘It looked like a chemical burn and the red marks didn’t start to calm down until over an hour after we took it off,’ Alexandra said of her son (pictured left and right)
‘Mckenzie looked in the mirror and asked me: “Is it going to stay like this mummy?”‘ Alexandra said
The next day Alexandra took her son to the doctor who also confirmed the rash was akin to a ‘chemical burn.’
She says Mckenzie still complained his face was itchy but the aggressive red marks had mostly calmed down.
The worried mother says she is lucky the face paint didn’t touch the skin of her other child, who suffers from the skin disorder eczema.
Her biggest concern now is to warn other mothers to avoid the cheap $4 makeup kit.
The next day Alexandra (pictured) took her son to the doctor who also confirmed the rash was akin to a ‘chemical burn’
Her biggest concern now is to warn other mothers to avoid the cheap $4 makeup kit (pictured) which is still on sale at Woolworths
‘At the end of the day if it is dangerous I hope it’s removed from the shelf and doesn’t cause anyone else grief,’ Alexandra said (makeup kit pictured)
‘I just hope no other child or parent has to go through that because that was quite scary, I was running around like mad,’ Alexandra said.
‘At the end of the day if it is dangerous I hope it’s removed from the shelf and doesn’t cause anyone else grief.’
Alexandra says she contacted Woolworths, who apologised for the incident and confirmed they were performing an internal investigation.
She also said that the individual face paint has been sent back to Woolworths for testing.
According to a Woolworths spokesperson, the product has been available since early October, but this is the only incident to date.