Avoiding the sun may actually make you sick
Before you pile on layers of clothing and sunscreen, you might want to read this.
The Vitamin D Society, a Canadian non-profit group dedicated to increasing awareness around vitamin D and how it relates to your health, recently released a study claiming that overly restrictive sun exposure may actually be more dangerous than soaking up a few rays.
“Humans have adapted to sun exposure over many thousands of years and derive numerous physiological benefits from UV exposure, in addition to vitamin D,” says Carole Baggerly, the study lead and director of an organization called GrassrootsHealth, said in a press release. “These benefits cannot be replaced by vitamin D supplements and therefore sun avoidance being recommended by the US Surgeon General, the Canadian Cancer Society, the Canadian Dermatology Association and others, is unnecessarily putting Canadians at risk.”
Baggerly is not alone in this thought. Dr. Reinhold Vieth, the study’s scientific advisor and a professor at the University of Toronto explains, “with increasing amounts of evidence suggesting that vitamin D may protect against cancer, heart disease, diabetes, multiple sclerosis and other chronic diseases, it’s more important than ever to examine this issue more closely.”
The study comes during a time when many have begun questioning the safety of using sunscreen. Though most concerns are linked to potentially toxic ingredients like oxybenzone, Vieth tells Yahoo Canada that it is the act of avoiding sun exposure altogether that may actually be most dangerous.
“It is simplistic to say that there is no such thing as a safe tan,” Vieth says. “However, there is a lot of evidence that in the long run, people who do not go outside into the sunshine suffer health consequences.”
Sun exposure
“Zero exposure to ultraviolet light will cause more harm than good,” Vieth claims. That said, he isn’t suggesting people go out and get a sun burn.
To determine a “safe” amount of sun exposure, Vieth suggests using a formula that looks at skin type and the UV index. For example, if the UV index is four (meaning your shadow length is equal to your height), someone with very pale (or Type 1) skin needs a minimal erythemal dose (MED) of two hours. To avoid burn, Vieth suggests cutting the MED in half to one hour. For someone with dark skin and the same UV index of four, exposure increases to 12 hours as darker skin naturally has an SPF of six giving it six times the protection when compared to the Type 1 skin. If the UV index increases to the point where your shadow is only a third of your height, safe exposure drastically decreases to more like 10 minutes for Type 1 skin.
If this formula seems complicated Vieth offers a basic rule of thumb, “Know your skin type and limit unprotected exposure to half the amount of exposure that would turn your skin red.”
What about cancer?
One of the biggest arguments for sun protection (and avoidance) is skin cancer and melanoma. Vieth understands this but suggests, “show me evidence that melanoma risk is more dangerous than sun exposure.”
Comparing mortality rates, Vieth explains, “in Canada, the Canadian Cancer Society estimates that 1150 people will die from melanoma in 2015. For comparison, a statistical analysis of the effect of vitamin D on health estimated that low vitamin D levels were causing 37,000 premature deaths of Canadians.”
This is not to say that vitamin D is not already on the radar for the Canadian Cancer Society. On their website, they suggest that there is “growing evidence that vitamin D may reduce the risk of some types of cancer, particularly colorectal and breast cancers.” The site offers information on supplements and exposure saying, “a few minutes a day of unprotected sun exposure is usually all that is needed for some people to get enough vitamin D.”
As for the other times when the UV index is high or after you have already soaked up the appropriate dose of vitamin D, Vieth encourages applying sunscreen but suggests using these guidelines:
Skip the spray
“Sunscreen only works if you spread it well over your skin,” he explains. “I have seen many people use spray-on sunscreens and then end up with blotchy sunburns because they forget to rub the sunscreen smoothly all over the skin.”
Understand SPF
He also explains how SPF works by multiplying your MED to increase your exposure time. For example, someone with a 10 minute MED wearing SPF 10 can increase their exposure time to 100 minutes. “Because sunscreen rubs off, it is better to apply an SPF 10 once every hour than to apply an SPF 60 once and think that everything is okay for the rest of the day,” he argues.
Do you agree with this research? Or do you think that any exposure is harmful? Let us know by tweeting @YahooStyleCA
