Should you buy an anti-wrinkle straw to stop lines around your lips?

From fillers to creams, there are plenty of treatments promising to help prevent wrinkles around the mouth.

Many older women now rue their youthful smoking habit for giving them so-called barcode lines above their upper lip from years of pursing.

And though Gen Z may have turned their backs on smoking, drinking and other bad behaviours, there’s another habit they have picked up that is apparently causing them their own lip problems: cups with an in-built straw.

The breakout — and somewhat baffling — trend of last year was the Stanley Cup, a combination of a Thermos-style flask and a child’s sippy cup. Celebrities and TikTok-mad twenty-somethings embraced the cup and others like it in their droves, raving about the fact it ‘keeps you hydrated’.

The straw bends sideways and has a hole in the top. Like playing a flute in reverse, you loosely wrap your lips around it as you suck away

It also keeps cold drinks cold and hot drinks hot, which is obviously revolutionary. The sexy thing is to walk around with it while sipping through the straw.

Now, to avert straw-induced disaster in the shape of what cosmetic doctors call ‘peri-oral lines’ (and to make a quick buck), someone’s managed to convince Gen Z — who, according to a study, consume more skincare than all other generations — that they need to invest in an ‘anti-wrinkle straw’ in order to keep their pout ‘forever youthful’.

Said straw, which can be bought in multipacks on Amazon from various brands starting at £5 for four, bends sideways and has a hole in the top. Like playing a flute, you loosely wrap your lips around it as you suck away. The idea is that it dispenses with the need to overly purse your mouth around a tiny tube.

Videos tagged ‘anti-wrinkle straw’ have had over 600 million views on TikTok as enthusiastic, and mostly young, drinkers go into ecstasies over it. One twenty-something influencer, with ­typical lack of understatement, ­proclaims it ‘possibly the best anti-aging invention ever’. So, are they on to something?

Ladies, I’m all for looking after your health and skin to ­significantly put the breaks on the ageing process. I have not ­sunbathed for 30 years, never go to bed without a cleansed face, have an intricate skincare regime and am committed to exercise and eating my five-a-day. But an anti-wrinkle straw is not ­something I’ll be embracing.

‘What’s next — anti-wrinkle cigarettes?’ says cosmetic physician and skincare expert Dr Wassim Taktouk, when I explain the straw. ‘What abject nonsense.

‘Yes, pursing lips over a lifetime will eventually see lines setting in — as does 40 years of talking, laughing and expressing yourself. Making odd duck lips as opposed to fully pursed ones on the odd occasion you use a straw is really not going to slow this process.’

Anti-wrinkle straws start at £5 for four on shopping websites such as Amazon, but skincare experts say claims they can prevent wrinkles are dubious

The onset of any wrinkles, he adds, is primarily caused by ­collagen loss and cell destruction due to sun damage, a less than nutritious diet and bad habits such as smoking (more so for reasons of inhaling poison than persistent pursing) and drinking.

Using a daily high-SPF moisturiser (I like No7 Future Renew Damage Protection Defence Shield SPF50, £24.95) is what is going to prevent wrinkles for this generation, he says.

He recommends SkinCeuticals CE Ferulic High Potency Triple Antioxidant Treatment, £165, because it’s proven to neutralise damaging pollutants, and potentially a skin-regenerating retinol for those approaching their 30s (try Elizabeth Arden Retinol + HPR Ceramide Rapid Skin Renewing Water Cream, £60).

‘Those are the building blocks of great skin that will make a difference to how you age,’ he says. ‘Buying into fads won’t.’

So, that’s one thing you can remove from your beauty shopping list, whatever your age.