Most of you know, I ventured into formulating my own organic skin care range due to the fact I discovered the health & beauty industry wasn't all its cranked up to be. I was more than shocked to find (through my own initiative to research) that the big brand names in cosmetics have been formulating their 'beauty' products with harsh chemicals that cause various health problems such as disrupting hormones, causing skin allergens and even cancer.
So how do they get away with it? Excellent question, however not one that I can easily answer. But If I gambled, I'd be betting it has something to do with money of course. Okay, so let's take a look at some of the biggest cosmetic companies like Revlon, L'Oreal and even Avon. Their products have been tested with a definite moderate-serious 'hazardous' outcome (See EWG's Cosmetic Data Base) but are still sold to consumers as 'safe' for external use. Here's where it gets concerning....... These companies also all have annual events which promotes that a certain amount of monies from products sold for such and such event will go to........... (Drum roll)........ the Cancer Council? Or even the Skin & Cancer Foundation? Yes!
How much money do you think the Cancer Council and Skin & Cancer Foundations are making? Oh sorry, of course there's no profits because it all goes to research. Yer right! Am I the only one who feels these organisations are full of it? (Crap, that is). I know many of you think the same.
You need to understand that the big businesses selling/supporting these products get a lot of money in return. This article is not to bring down these big companies and organisations. It's about raising the awareness of the ingredients used to formulate many products, in particular to this article, sunscreen lotions.
I've always believed that a little sun exposure without sunscreen is good. Mainly for Vitamin D absorption. I strongly believe my ethnicity and genetics plus foods I consumed from a child and now, play a huge role in my body' natural concentration of melanin. I've never had issues with extreme burning (unless I've been stupid and spent a long time in direct and hot sunlight in summer); and this brings me to the main focus of this article
Sunscreens are filters of UV energy. They are used to filter a PROPORTION ONLY of UV rays. By definition, all types of sunscreen will include active ingredients which either absorb or scatter and reflect UV energy which would otherwise enter the skin and cause severe damage.
Myth: If you wear sunscreen you are fully protected from UV absorption and the suns harmful rays UVA and UVB and will not burn.
Not true! Sunscreens are a means to REDUCE ONLY a dose of sunburn you will get if you don’t wear it. Hence, as sunscreen is used to delay this burning affect and to filter the penetration of Ultra Violet activity.
Sunscreens are filters, not “blocks”. All of them will let some UV through at varying rates indicated by the SPF number. An SPF 30 product will permit 1/30th of the sunburning energy through it in the same time as it would take to suffer a minimal sunburn without any protection at all.
The whole of this definition is important to understanding how they work. It is because the sunburning dose accumulates at 1/30 of the rate that it takes 30 times as long to see the skin reddening sign that damage has occurred and repair and recovery is underway.
Sunburn may take hours to actually appear on the skin. and once you receive a dose of sunburn, no sunscreen or re-application is going to prevent this effect. This is why it is necessary to apply your sunscreen BEFORE sun exposure.Re-application of sunscreen is MAINTENANCE of the very first application.It does not prolong your time in the sun; it merely gives the first application a boost, enhancing its effectiveness.
Of course other factors such as the Country you live in, ethnicity and the strength of the sun as well as nutritional intake, do play key roles in the impact of skin burning and repair. But this article is solely to discuss the topic of sunscreens alone and if their ingredients effect our health in a negative way.
The reality is I could write pages on my findings, but to get you all up and doing some of your own digging around here is a link I encourage you all to have a look. Here you can track down products you currently use or thinking of using and see how the testing of these products rate in safety. Also if you have a mobile device, you download their app to and all you do is scan the barcode which will look up the product for you. Check it out, EWG's Skin Deep Cosmetic Data Base www.ewg.org/skindeep
I personally tested 4 sunscreen products. One supported by the Skin & Cancer Foundation, two natural and one certified organic. I looked at each and every single ingredient and percentages used. I was astounded to conclude the only product I would never use again, is in fact the sun lotion support by the Skin & Cancer Foundation. Every single ingredient is synthetic in this product (which are also found in most other well known brands) but claimed as a 'safe' enough product to sell direct to public.
I am not a professional toxicologist so am in no way qualified to dispute people who are. The question of safety is different from the question of whether something is an allergen. There are lots of 'safe' ingredients that are used in cosmetics which also happen to be allergens that some people should avoid.
For example; A brief search through published literature shows that Octocrylene had 2 reported cases of being an allergen in 2003 but according to an article published in the Contact Dermatitis journal, reports of positive patch testing have been increasing. According to this more recent review in Archives of Dermatology more cases have been identified. Their conclusion is interesting…
"Octocrylene appears to be a strong allergen leading to contact dermatitis in children and mostly photoallergic contact dermatitis in adults with an often-associated history of photoallergy from ketoprofen. Patients with photoallergy from ketoprofen frequently have positive photopatch test reactions to octocrylene. These patients need to be informed of sunscreen products not containing octocrylene, benzophenone-3, or fragrances."
The all natural and organic products I used and researched had just as good protection from the sun and were indeed all natural and contained no synthetics and no harsh chemicals. If I had children, these would be choice of sun protection.
So how do they get away with it? Excellent question, however not one that I can easily answer. But If I gambled, I'd be betting it has something to do with money of course. Okay, so let's take a look at some of the biggest cosmetic companies like Revlon, L'Oreal and even Avon. Their products have been tested with a definite moderate-serious 'hazardous' outcome (See EWG's Cosmetic Data Base) but are still sold to consumers as 'safe' for external use. Here's where it gets concerning....... These companies also all have annual events which promotes that a certain amount of monies from products sold for such and such event will go to........... (Drum roll)........ the Cancer Council? Or even the Skin & Cancer Foundation? Yes!
How much money do you think the Cancer Council and Skin & Cancer Foundations are making? Oh sorry, of course there's no profits because it all goes to research. Yer right! Am I the only one who feels these organisations are full of it? (Crap, that is). I know many of you think the same.
You need to understand that the big businesses selling/supporting these products get a lot of money in return. This article is not to bring down these big companies and organisations. It's about raising the awareness of the ingredients used to formulate many products, in particular to this article, sunscreen lotions.
I've always believed that a little sun exposure without sunscreen is good. Mainly for Vitamin D absorption. I strongly believe my ethnicity and genetics plus foods I consumed from a child and now, play a huge role in my body' natural concentration of melanin. I've never had issues with extreme burning (unless I've been stupid and spent a long time in direct and hot sunlight in summer); and this brings me to the main focus of this article
Sunscreens are filters of UV energy. They are used to filter a PROPORTION ONLY of UV rays. By definition, all types of sunscreen will include active ingredients which either absorb or scatter and reflect UV energy which would otherwise enter the skin and cause severe damage.
Myth: If you wear sunscreen you are fully protected from UV absorption and the suns harmful rays UVA and UVB and will not burn.
Not true! Sunscreens are a means to REDUCE ONLY a dose of sunburn you will get if you don’t wear it. Hence, as sunscreen is used to delay this burning affect and to filter the penetration of Ultra Violet activity.
Sunscreens are filters, not “blocks”. All of them will let some UV through at varying rates indicated by the SPF number. An SPF 30 product will permit 1/30th of the sunburning energy through it in the same time as it would take to suffer a minimal sunburn without any protection at all.
The whole of this definition is important to understanding how they work. It is because the sunburning dose accumulates at 1/30 of the rate that it takes 30 times as long to see the skin reddening sign that damage has occurred and repair and recovery is underway.
Sunburn may take hours to actually appear on the skin. and once you receive a dose of sunburn, no sunscreen or re-application is going to prevent this effect. This is why it is necessary to apply your sunscreen BEFORE sun exposure.Re-application of sunscreen is MAINTENANCE of the very first application.It does not prolong your time in the sun; it merely gives the first application a boost, enhancing its effectiveness.
Of course other factors such as the Country you live in, ethnicity and the strength of the sun as well as nutritional intake, do play key roles in the impact of skin burning and repair. But this article is solely to discuss the topic of sunscreens alone and if their ingredients effect our health in a negative way.
The reality is I could write pages on my findings, but to get you all up and doing some of your own digging around here is a link I encourage you all to have a look. Here you can track down products you currently use or thinking of using and see how the testing of these products rate in safety. Also if you have a mobile device, you download their app to and all you do is scan the barcode which will look up the product for you. Check it out, EWG's Skin Deep Cosmetic Data Base www.ewg.org/skindeep
I personally tested 4 sunscreen products. One supported by the Skin & Cancer Foundation, two natural and one certified organic. I looked at each and every single ingredient and percentages used. I was astounded to conclude the only product I would never use again, is in fact the sun lotion support by the Skin & Cancer Foundation. Every single ingredient is synthetic in this product (which are also found in most other well known brands) but claimed as a 'safe' enough product to sell direct to public.
I am not a professional toxicologist so am in no way qualified to dispute people who are. The question of safety is different from the question of whether something is an allergen. There are lots of 'safe' ingredients that are used in cosmetics which also happen to be allergens that some people should avoid.
For example; A brief search through published literature shows that Octocrylene had 2 reported cases of being an allergen in 2003 but according to an article published in the Contact Dermatitis journal, reports of positive patch testing have been increasing. According to this more recent review in Archives of Dermatology more cases have been identified. Their conclusion is interesting…
"Octocrylene appears to be a strong allergen leading to contact dermatitis in children and mostly photoallergic contact dermatitis in adults with an often-associated history of photoallergy from ketoprofen. Patients with photoallergy from ketoprofen frequently have positive photopatch test reactions to octocrylene. These patients need to be informed of sunscreen products not containing octocrylene, benzophenone-3, or fragrances."
The all natural and organic products I used and researched had just as good protection from the sun and were indeed all natural and contained no synthetics and no harsh chemicals. If I had children, these would be choice of sun protection.
I cant tell you which products you should or shouldn't buy. But let's look at it this way - If you had a choice to pick an apple to eat from a non chemically treated environment or to pick and eat an apple from a tree that has been sprayed with pesticides and chemicals added to the soil, which would you choose? Its pretty obvious. So why should the choices of what we put on our skin be any different? Especially when what we do put on our skin is absorbed straight into the blood stream.
The products I tested are:
Neutrogena's Beach Defense (supported by the Skin & Cancer Foundation) - A BIG NO NO
Invisible Zinc Face sun lotion - GOOD
Invisable Zinc Body sun lotion - GOOD
Wot Not Face & Body sun lotion - MY FAVOURITE
Eat well
Make better household and skin care product choices
Live well.
Please share this and your new found knowledge with your loved ones!
Georgia
