People that have pimples can relate to trying different remedies to ensure that they eradicate the zits but if you’ve ever tried using toothpaste to get a smooth face, you might want to rethink how you treat acne. Pimples can be annoying for acne sufferers and most are ready to do just about anything to get rid of their zits.

Each and every year, as much as a billion people worldwide suffer from some form of acne or the other. Furthermore, each and every year, an even larger number of people develop teeth. So, naturally, it comes as a relief that a remedy for acne would be found in something so readily available and used everyday by billions of people worldwide: toothpaste!

The use of toothpaste as a home remedy for pimples is touted over the Internet by some people and brushed aside by others that totally don’t have a vested interest in the topic.

On the other hand, one prevailing argument against the use of toothpaste – an unconventional topical treatment can be found right on the tube itself.

According to some experts, it all comes down to whether or not your toothpaste has a certain chemical in it. Triclosan, a bacteria-fighting agent that was more commonly found in soaps and body washes (and recently banned from most of those soap products), is the very ingredient in toothpaste that is frequently touted for its ability to dry out blemishes. However, this particular ingredient has also been shown to cause hormone disruption.

Dr. Joshua Zeichner, the Director of Cosmetic and Clinical Research in Dermatology at Mount Sinai Hospital, says that using the toothpaste remedy for your pimples “may, in fact, decrease the size of a red angry zit,” but “if you have access to a traditional acne medications… use that product over toothpaste.”

Well, you know what to do. Keep the paste in your mouth.