Speaker 1: You're listening to Part Time Genius, the production of Kaleidoscope
Speaker 1: and iHeartRadio.
Speaker 2: Guess what, Well, what's that Mango?
Speaker 1: So the US Open starts this week and I was
Speaker 1: thinking about that old Seinfeld, the one where they're at
Speaker 1: the match talking about sunscreen.
Speaker 2: I think maybe I'm gonna need you to be a
Speaker 2: little bit more specific. I was a fan of the show,
Speaker 2: but I'm not remembering here.
Speaker 1: Let me just play this clip.
Speaker 2: For you, the ways the sunblock. Yeah, it says Papa
Speaker 2: in it.
Speaker 1: I need Papa free.
Speaker 2: You got a problem with Papa? Yes, I have a
Speaker 2: problem with Papa. You don't even know what Paba is.
Speaker 2: No enough to stay away from. Ah classic Seinfeld dialogue.
Speaker 2: It's like nothing happens and nothing matters.
Speaker 1: It is beautiful. But I kept thinking about the scene
Speaker 1: this summer because I've been getting back into playing tennis. Actually,
Speaker 1: my friend Joanna keeps making fun of me and calling
Speaker 1: me a little tennis prince because I keep talking about it.
Speaker 1: But as you probably know, I hate wearing sunscreen. I
Speaker 1: do not like the way it feels. I don't like
Speaker 1: that it doesn't quite rub into my skin, and it
Speaker 1: makes me look white or purple when I try to
Speaker 1: rub it in, but when you're spending hours outside, obviously
Speaker 1: you don't want to burn or get skin damage. And
Speaker 1: it's hard to figure out which sunscreens are actually good.
Speaker 1: So I thought maybe we could look into it a little.
Speaker 2: And I'm curious if you ever figured out what Papa is.
Speaker 1: Papa. There's some problems with Papa. I'll explain it in
Speaker 1: a minute.
Speaker 2: Hey, their podcast listeners, Welcome to Part Time Genius. I'm
Speaker 2: Will Pearson and as always I'm joined by my good
Speaker 2: friend mangesh Ho Ticketer and sitting there behind that big
Speaker 2: glass booth. Actually it's sort of hard to see him
Speaker 2: because there's a lot of white smudged all over there,
Speaker 2: and wearing armlength UV gloves, giant Hollywood sunglasses, and the
Speaker 2: top it off, he's got an umbrella hat. I didn't
Speaker 2: even know he owned one of those, which I think
Speaker 2: is a Japanese contraption he ordered online. If I'm not mistaken,
Speaker 2: that is our good friend Dylan.
Speaker 1: So I guess Dylan is really trying to protect his
Speaker 1: skin and avoiding any sun today, which is on theme,
Speaker 1: and I guess makes sense, except that we're all sitting indoors.
Speaker 2: You can never be too careful there, all right, So
Speaker 2: let's get back to sunscreen. We are old enough that
Speaker 2: when we were kids, you just run around the neighborhood
Speaker 2: without really thinking too much about sun protection, especially when
Speaker 2: it wasn't that hot out. But over time, everyone's just
Speaker 2: gotten used to putting it on all the time. I
Speaker 2: don't know if you're this way with your kids, but
Speaker 2: my kids hardly ever go outside without sunscreen on.
Speaker 1: No, it's the same over here. And it's one of
Speaker 1: those things like wine or chocolate, where every time you
Speaker 1: read an article about sunscreen, it's either like sunscreen is
Speaker 1: going to save you from cancer or sunscreen is giving
Speaker 1: you cancer, and it is hard to parse out. So
Speaker 1: I thought it'd be good to look at some of
Speaker 1: the stuff.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and I know we want to talk about Papa
Speaker 2: and sunscreens and what some of the terminology means, But
Speaker 2: why don't we start from the very beginning with a
Speaker 2: bit of a primer on where sunscreen actually comes from.
Speaker 1: Yeah, that's a good idea. So originally sunscreens and sun
Speaker 1: protection wasn't done so much out of a life saving necessity,
Speaker 1: but more out of this sort of cosmetic concern and
Speaker 1: the ancient Egyptians used various methods of sun protection because
Speaker 1: lighter skin was more desirable culturally, which obviously has been
Speaker 1: a thing all over the world. In India, they used
Speaker 1: to make this awful skin bleaching thing called fair and
Speaker 1: Lovely to make you look more light skinned. But in
Speaker 1: ancient Egypt they use stuff like rice brand, jasmine, and
Speaker 1: lupine to block the tanning effects of the sun on
Speaker 1: the skin.
Speaker 2: And did any of that stuff actually work?
Speaker 1: Yeah? So, actually rice brand absorbs UV light and jasmine
Speaker 1: helps repair DNA, and lupine's the thing that lightens the skin.
Speaker 1: So if your goal was to look like an indoor
Speaker 1: kid or a vampire, it wasn't a bad combo. But
Speaker 1: that wasn't the only way that early people protected their
Speaker 1: skin from the sun. The Greeks pioneered the idea of
Speaker 1: slathering olive oil on your skin to protect it. It
Speaker 1: turns out that olive oil has an SPF of around eight.
Speaker 2: I would have thought the exact opposite, because you always
Speaker 2: know those kids when we were younger that would like
Speaker 2: put the oil on themselves to try to get a
Speaker 2: better tan or a burn in many cases. But that's
Speaker 2: good to know, so I guess if you're out of
Speaker 2: sun's green, maybe just pivot to salad dressing.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean everyone of the beach loves the guy
Speaker 1: who smells like hot garlics, so totally. Some protection continues
Speaker 1: to be about racism basically well into the sixteen hundreds,
Speaker 1: and you have things like women in Europe using velvet
Speaker 1: face bizards to protect themselves. And it isn't until eight
Speaker 1: ninety six that really there's this first idea of sun
Speaker 1: exposure and skin cancer being linked that comes from a
Speaker 1: German physician named Paul Anna, and he termed these pre
Speaker 1: cancerous changes sailor's skin carcinoma or in German seema's shout
Speaker 1: a carzinome.
Speaker 2: Oh yeah, semen showers are causernome. Yeah, sc scary stuff.
Speaker 2: So how did he come up with something to protect
Speaker 2: against semen's shouder carcinome?
Speaker 1: So he did make something to help, but it wasn't
Speaker 1: very popular. It was made of horse chestnut and it
Speaker 1: was super thick and awkward on the skin. But basically
Speaker 1: two guys do emerge in the twentieth century as the
Speaker 1: godfathers of what we would recognize today as sunscreen. So
Speaker 1: the first is in nineteen forty four Benjamin Green. He's
Speaker 1: an airman and pharmacist. He used a greasy substance called
Speaker 1: red vet pet red veterinary petroleum to protect himself and
Speaker 1: other soldiers from ultraviolet rays during World War Two, and
Speaker 1: after the war he mixes this with cocoa butter and
Speaker 1: coconut oil into this product that would eventually become Coppertone
Speaker 1: Suntan Cream. And the second person is a Swiss chemistry
Speaker 1: student named Franz Greider. This is in nineteen thirty eight.
Speaker 1: He got a sunburn while climbing this mountain, Mount Pisbooon,
Speaker 1: so he invented a product called Glacier Cream and it's
Speaker 1: under the brand Pisboon. In the nineteen seventies he introduces
Speaker 1: sunscreens with ultraviolet A and ultraviolet B filters.
Speaker 2: You know, actually, I was looking up a little of
Speaker 2: the history of Coppertone, which is of course famous for
Speaker 2: that old logo with the toddler and the dog pulling
Speaker 2: at the underwear, and I guess the idea was to
Speaker 2: show a tan line there. And what's weird is that
Speaker 2: the original tagline for that campaign was don't be.
Speaker 1: A pale face, isn't uh isn't it the girl's bum
Speaker 1: that's exposed? Like why did they use that tagline?
Speaker 2: I was curious about the exact same thing, and I
Speaker 2: guess Coppertne was mainly about preventing but also allowing you
Speaker 2: to tan. And before they had that Baby on the
Speaker 2: Beach campaign, copper Tone's logo was of a Native American
Speaker 2: chief basically encouraging everyone to get tan. They later changed
Speaker 2: it to tan, Don't burn and for the fastest tan,
Speaker 2: things like that, both of which are a little more PC.
Speaker 2: But you know, obviously we're going to get into sunscreens
Speaker 2: in just a bit. But as you were talking about
Speaker 2: the ancient Egyptians who were lotioning up with rice brand
Speaker 2: and jasmine, it did get me thinking about the Dylan
Speaker 2: like approaches that some other civilizations used to protect themselves
Speaker 2: from the sun.
Speaker 1: Like umbrella hats.
Speaker 2: Well more umbrellas and hats, not really that brilliant combination
Speaker 2: that was eventually brought together. But one thing I found
Speaker 2: interesting was that parasols were symbols of status and power
Speaker 2: throughout Asia and Africa. And again this does get into
Speaker 2: racist notions where fair skin sort of signified higher birth,
Speaker 2: but ceremonial parasols which were carried by tendants. They actually
Speaker 2: helped preserve the pale complexions of the elite, which reinforced
Speaker 2: their entitlement to rule, so sun protection was actually subject
Speaker 2: to law, like for example, in Assyria, only the king
Speaker 2: himself could use a parasol. Now by this sixteen hundred's
Speaker 2: personal sun shades had filtered down to a few more
Speaker 2: of the classes, and parasols were customary and Mediterranean Europe,
Speaker 2: mostly among women, where sunburn or freckled skin was generally
Speaker 2: avoided at all costs by polite society, and gentil ladies
Speaker 2: went to great links to preserve the pale complexion expected
Speaker 2: of their rank and their sex.
Speaker 1: I know, you think about all the toxic powders that
Speaker 1: women of the court used to wear in Victorian times
Speaker 1: to make themselves whiter, or like Japanese women would wear,
Speaker 1: and it had mercury in it. I think the Victorian
Speaker 1: women had arsenic in it, and it was all to
Speaker 1: show people they were of such high class that they
Speaker 1: never had to work in the sun or be exposed
Speaker 1: as sun. But you wonder how did we go from
Speaker 1: those extremes to like tans being a sign of status.
Speaker 2: It really started in the nineteen twenties when socialites started
Speaker 2: frequenting glamorous beaches of California and the French Riviera, and
Speaker 2: it became fashionable to acquire a sun tan. And there's
Speaker 2: a lot of chatter about how Coco Chanel kind of
Speaker 2: launched a movement and used tan mannequins, but actually it
Speaker 2: predates her.
Speaker 1: Oh that's interesting. So now that we've talked a little
Speaker 1: bit about the history of sunscreens and went a little
Speaker 1: off track with parasols, let's get back to original question.
Speaker 1: Do sunscreens actually do anything? All?
Speaker 2: Right? Well, why don't we start with that Seinfeld clip
Speaker 2: U teased at the beginning of the show. So what
Speaker 2: is papa.
Speaker 1: Papa is an organic compound that can absorb UVB rays
Speaker 1: and those are the UV rays that caused sunburns. So
Speaker 1: it was a really popular ingredient in sunscreens starting in
Speaker 1: the nineteen forties. PAPA stands for para amino benzoic acid,
Speaker 1: but unfortu actunately, it caused allergic reactions in a significant
Speaker 1: part of the population. So PAPA is no longer approved
Speaker 1: by the FDA for use in sunscreens.
Speaker 2: And I'm guessing it gets banned in the nineties, like
Speaker 2: around the time of that clip from Seinfeld.
Speaker 1: So weirdly, the FDA only put PABA on its list
Speaker 1: of unsafe for ineffective compounds in twenty nineteen. So even
Speaker 1: though George Costanza warned us about PAPA way back in
Speaker 1: nineteen ninety three, the FDA does tend to move a
Speaker 1: little bit slowly on these things.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean to be fair, George Costanza also lied
Speaker 2: about being a marine biologist and tried to get the
Speaker 2: Yankees to wear cotton uniform so he's not exactly a
Speaker 2: trusted source. But how exactly is the FDA defining sunscreens
Speaker 2: and making some of these decisions?
Speaker 1: So I came prepared for this question. Sunscreen refers to
Speaker 1: a product in the US which is typically a lotion, cream, gel,
Speaker 1: or spray that blocks harmful UV rays from damaging your skin,
Speaker 1: and it also includes filters, which are the active ingredients
Speaker 1: in sunscreen. A sunscreen product is a mix of various moisturizers, fragrances, preservatives,
Speaker 1: and of course the filters. But these filters can vary,
Speaker 1: and in fact, I'm sure you've heard some of your
Speaker 1: fancier friends talk about how European and Asian sunscreens are
Speaker 1: far superior.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean people always say you got to go
Speaker 2: far away to find the best stuff. You think about
Speaker 2: Belgian chocolates, Japanese kit cats, I mean, I know you
Speaker 2: think about Japanese kit cats, Korean face mask and fried chicken,
Speaker 2: and pop music like the list goes on.
Speaker 1: I mean, the K pop thing is crazy to me.
Speaker 1: Like the last time I was in India, kids knew
Speaker 1: more about kpop than they did about American bands for
Speaker 1: the first time, and that was something that never happened
Speaker 1: in my lifetime. But back to foreign sunscreens, So the
Speaker 1: sunscreen abroad works better because the filters are actually better.
Speaker 1: There are all kinds of UV filters that have been
Speaker 1: approved for decades in Europe and Asia, but aren't approved
Speaker 1: in the US because in most of the world, sunscreen
Speaker 1: is actually classified as a cosmetic but in the US
Speaker 1: that isn't the case.
Speaker 2: And why is that.
Speaker 1: Back in nineteen thirty eight, the Federal Food, Drug and
Speaker 1: Cosmetic Act was passed and it required sunscreens to be
Speaker 1: classified as both a cosmetic and a drug and drugs
Speaker 1: have to be tested on animals.
Speaker 2: Wait, we had a law that required us to test
Speaker 2: sunscreen on animals.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean the intentions were good. And remember this
Speaker 1: is from nineteen thirty eight when the Act was really
Speaker 1: a huge advance in US food policy, and it took
Speaker 1: a lot of effort, Like the US largely through the
Speaker 1: efforts of women's groups, pioneered policies that were designed to
Speaker 1: protect the pocketbooks of consumers, and all these standards were
Speaker 1: implemented for safety and ensuring value. But sunscreen fell into
Speaker 1: this weird gray area because of the question of is
Speaker 1: sunscreen a drug or cosmetic? And the thing is it's
Speaker 1: pretty hard to answer. Like the way the fd and
Speaker 1: C ACT defined cosmetics is quo as articles intended to
Speaker 1: be rubbed, poured, sprinkled, or sprayed on, introduced into, or
Speaker 1: otherwise applied to the human body for cleansing, beautifying, promoting attractiveness,
Speaker 1: or altering the appearance.
Speaker 2: Okay, I mean, with the exception of sprinkling, I don't
Speaker 2: think I've ever sprinkled sunscreen, But that does sound like
Speaker 2: what sunscreen is.
Speaker 1: Yeah. And the way the FDNC defines drugs is articles
Speaker 1: intended for use in the mitigation, treatment, or prevention of disease.
Speaker 2: That that also sounds what sunscreen is.
Speaker 1: Yeah, so you see the problem, and it isn't just sunscreen.
Speaker 1: So like a lot of products fall into this both
Speaker 1: category if you think about it, like anti dandrift shampoo
Speaker 1: is a cosmetic because you know it's used to clean
Speaker 1: the hair, and it's also a drug because it's intended
Speaker 1: to treat dan drift. Toothpaste claims to freshen your breath
Speaker 1: and cleanse the teeth, but it also contains fluoride. Like,
Speaker 1: these products all have to meet the standards of both
Speaker 1: cosmetics and drugs.
Speaker 2: So to get back to the animal thing, it still
Speaker 2: sounds like one of those standards for drugs in the
Speaker 2: US is testing it on animals.
Speaker 1: Yeah, And to be clear, there was a new law
Speaker 1: passed last year that says drugs no longer have to
Speaker 1: be tested on animals. President Biden signed a law that
Speaker 1: you can use organ chips and computer modeling and other
Speaker 1: types of electronics in place of animal testing. But according
Speaker 1: to the journal Science, it'll take a while for the
Speaker 1: industry to adapt to these methods and it's unclear how
Speaker 1: much it'll actually change things because, as one scientist in
Speaker 1: the article put it, quote, we can drop a new
Speaker 1: candidate drug onto a bunch of liver cells, and we
Speaker 1: can see that it doesn't damage them, But what we
Speaker 1: don't know is whether it's going to make a person cough,
Speaker 1: whether it's going to damage their own testines or their brain.
Speaker 1: So it's a really deeply complicated issue, and drugs obviously
Speaker 1: deserve to be tested deeply, but the European Union has
Speaker 1: long banned any animal testing of cosmetics, which is how
Speaker 1: they define sunscreen, and because the regulations are more lax
Speaker 1: in places like France, they can actually innovate and test
Speaker 1: much more quickly.
Speaker 2: All right, let's talk a little bit about the specifics
Speaker 2: you see on a sunscreen, Like what type of sunscreen
Speaker 2: are you using?
Speaker 1: I try to go for every single benefit. It' says,
Speaker 1: so like a fifty plus SPF broad spectrum waterproof REEF
Speaker 1: safe sunscreen.
Speaker 2: You just said so much, nothing like you know, you
Speaker 2: don't even know. I don't think I know.
Speaker 1: I just like words and I trust advertising. But I
Speaker 1: feel like if I if I slap some of this
Speaker 1: on my face and go play a tennis, I've covered right.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean, the first thing you should know is
Speaker 2: that there's no such thing as an all day, waterproof,
Speaker 2: sweat proof sunscreen. So if that's what you're hoping for,
Speaker 2: it actually doesn't exist, Mango.
Speaker 1: I mean, I'm not playing that long because I'm out
Speaker 1: of ship, so all day isn't really interesting for me.
Speaker 2: That's fair. But regardless, if you're out there for more
Speaker 2: than a few sets, you just have to reapply sunscreen
Speaker 2: like the rest of us, after you sweat or swim
Speaker 2: or just after a of hours.
Speaker 1: And what about this reef safe business, Like, I don't
Speaker 1: want to hurt the reefs, and you know how much
Speaker 1: I love reefs.
Speaker 2: You love the reefs. I mean, there's no standard or
Speaker 2: regulated meaning behind reef, say for reef friendly. This is
Speaker 2: something that comes up in a lot of places like
Speaker 2: Hawaii or Australia, where they obviously want to protect the
Speaker 2: coral and so some of the sunscreens that are labeled
Speaker 2: as reef save for sunscreens that aren't using things like
Speaker 2: oxybenzone or octanoxate too filters that might be harmful to
Speaker 2: coral reefs. But some of these reef safe products use
Speaker 2: minerals like titanium dioxide, which can produce hydrogen peroxide in
Speaker 2: the water, a chemical that's actually harmful to marine organisms.
Speaker 2: So again it's it's pretty murky when you look at
Speaker 2: something like that. But the reefs are under a much
Speaker 2: greater threat from climate change than from sun's grain, to
Speaker 2: be sure.
Speaker 1: And what about the SPF label on my ies on screen?
Speaker 2: So SPF stands for sun protection factor, and it's a
Speaker 2: measure of how well sunscreen protects the skin from UVB rays,
Speaker 2: not UVA. So quick Google search tells you that SPF
Speaker 2: compares how long it would take for the sun's UV
Speaker 2: rays to red and skin without sunscreen to how long
Speaker 2: it would take with sunscreen. And if it takes twenty
Speaker 2: minutes for unprotected skin to turn red, SPF thirty. Sunscreen
Speaker 2: prevents reddening for thirty times longer. But again, some of
Speaker 2: this is a little bit murky, Like there's this book
Speaker 2: called sun Tanning in the twentieth Century, and in it
Speaker 2: it talks about how spfs are really useful for manufacturers
Speaker 2: because fear is a powerful selling tool. Like in nineteen
Speaker 2: eighty two, this Forbes piece showed that sixty five percent
Speaker 2: of all sunscreen sold had an SPF value of only
Speaker 2: SPF two to SPF eight. But by nineteen ninety two,
Speaker 2: when things like ozone holes and skin cancer were in
Speaker 2: the public conversation, and sunscreen started to have this halo quality.
Speaker 2: As this per detective goop, most sunscreens started being SPF
Speaker 2: fifteen or higher, which is obviously better for protection, but
Speaker 2: part of the reason for the change was that companies
Speaker 2: could charge more. Like at the time, companies could charge
Speaker 2: four ninety nine or so for a bottle of SPF four,
Speaker 2: almost seven dollars for SPF eight and seven ninety nine
Speaker 2: for SPF fifteen, But the numbers didn't exactly match up,
Speaker 2: like SPF fifty supposedly only gave six percent more protection
Speaker 2: than SPF fifteen, So again it's all a little confusing.
Speaker 1: So what SPF should I be using? Then?
Speaker 2: Yeah, there's this whole debate about this, and we'll get
Speaker 2: into what Australia is recommending in a bit as a
Speaker 2: nation with some of the most skin cancer. But the
Speaker 2: American Academy of Dermatology recommends SPF thirty or higher, with
Speaker 2: an emphasis on higher, like most recommend anything from SPF
Speaker 2: fifty to seventy.
Speaker 1: Great, so I feel like at least I'm covered on
Speaker 1: that front. And what about the bit that says broad spectrum.
Speaker 2: Yeah, broad spectrum is a real term, but it means
Speaker 2: a lot of different things. So in the US, broad
Speaker 2: spectrum refers only to protection against UVA light. In Europe,
Speaker 2: broad spectrum also refers to the quality of UVB shielding.
Speaker 2: So brands earn the right to use that term broad
Speaker 2: spectrum if laboratory measurements of UVA protection are at least
Speaker 2: a third the values of laboratory measurements of UVB protection.
Speaker 2: You got this right. This is all super clear.
Speaker 1: So remind me what's the difference between VA and UVV, Like,
Speaker 1: which one's the bad one.
Speaker 2: Well, they can actually both be harmful. So UVB radiation
Speaker 2: makes up about five percent of the sun's UV light.
Speaker 2: It causes sunburns, damages the top layers of the skin,
Speaker 2: can cause DNA mutations that lead to skin cancer. And
Speaker 2: UVA radiation makes up about ninety five percent of the
Speaker 2: sun's UV light, and these rays penetrate deep into the skin.
Speaker 2: They go past the epidermis, which is that outermost layer
Speaker 2: of course, and into the dermis, which is that middle layer.
Speaker 2: They can even pass through glass, which is why you
Speaker 2: can get a sunburn while driving or sitting by a window.
Speaker 2: So these are the rays that caused sun tans. They
Speaker 2: cause wrinkles, sunspots, collagen damage, and those signs of aging.
Speaker 2: But what many people don't realize is that UVA rays
Speaker 2: can also cause cancer. I mean, all of.
Speaker 1: This is so scary. So if you buy a bottle
Speaker 1: of sunscreen in the US and it says broad spectrum,
Speaker 1: it means it might not protect against UVB light at all.
Speaker 2: I mean not only that, but according to a twenty
Speaker 2: ten Environmental Working Group analysis of four hundred and forty
Speaker 2: six beach and sports sunscreens, all of which had SPF
Speaker 2: ratings of thirty plus, nearly two thirds of them provided
Speaker 2: inadequate UVA protection, and a product survey by Procter and
Speaker 2: Gamble in two thousand and four noted that a third
Speaker 2: of products that claimed spectrum protection on the label didn't
Speaker 2: actually provide it. The most common UVA filter in the
Speaker 2: US is avibin zone, which was the last big filter
Speaker 2: approved in the US in the nineteen nineties. But among
Speaker 2: the UVA filters approved in Europe, the good ones we
Speaker 2: can't get, like three of them, tenosorb S, tenosorb M,
Speaker 2: and mexiil SX are between four and five times more
Speaker 2: protective than avibenzone.
Speaker 1: So I get that Europe and Asia have all these
Speaker 1: advanced sunscreens because of our I guess, rigorous testing process.
Speaker 1: But how do we know if these foreign filters are
Speaker 1: actually safe?
Speaker 2: Well, people in Europe and Asia have been using these
Speaker 2: newer chemical filters for years, decades in some cases, so
Speaker 2: industry advocates argue that there is plenty of data to
Speaker 2: support their safety. No one seems to be experiencing any
Speaker 2: widespread health problems related to these sunscreens.
Speaker 1: I mean, I guess when you've got populations of two
Speaker 1: continents and you've got about a decade of experience, it
Speaker 1: sounds like good data.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean, but the FBA is still dragging its feet.
Speaker 2: And on top of that, sunscreen manufacturers are reluctant to
Speaker 2: attempt the approval process because you know, the return on
Speaker 2: investment on sunscreen is low. Most of the UV filters
Speaker 2: in question aren't eligible for patent protection.
Speaker 1: That's where they're not actually covered by patents.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and because the profit margin on suns green is
Speaker 2: nowhere near what it is on pharmaceuticals. The battery of
Speaker 2: tests the FDA asks for takes years and cost a
Speaker 2: lot of money. Companies really aren't that incentivized to enter
Speaker 2: the US market. For instance, the top chemical maker DSM
Speaker 2: recently started advancing a filter known as tensorb S through
Speaker 2: the FDA approval process. It would be the first new
Speaker 2: UV filter to hit the US market since Abben Zone
Speaker 2: in the nineteen nineties. But the final bill for this
Speaker 2: process will come to between twelve million and twenty million dollars.
Speaker 2: Seven other organic V filters, all of which are in
Speaker 2: regular use and the rest of the world, are stuck
Speaker 2: in the FDA approval pipeline, even though Congress has repeatedly
Speaker 2: tried to force the agency to move faster.
Speaker 1: I mean, it's kind of fine to see that these
Speaker 1: things are actually bipartisan, Like Rand Paul was the one
Speaker 1: pushing away from animal testing to get meaningful drugs tested
Speaker 1: quicker and out to market faster, particularly during the COVID era.
Speaker 1: And then AOC was using TikTok to get people to
Speaker 1: press Congress for changes to sunscreen regulation. And I know
Speaker 1: she got some criticism because people were saying that she
Speaker 1: was making all this ruckus about a beauty product, but
Speaker 1: sunscreen obviously impacts a massive number of people's health.
Speaker 2: Yeah, of course. And it's particularly weird because while the
Speaker 2: FDA is dragging its feet to approve new filters. They're
Speaker 2: worried about some of the existing filters, where an FDA
Speaker 2: terms sunscreens that are not grace GRASEE, which is an
Speaker 2: acronym for generally recognized as safe and effective. So agencies
Speaker 2: has recently published a studies showing that under normal usage conditions,
Speaker 2: most commonly used organic UV filters show up in the
Speaker 2: bloodstream at levels that trigger a toxicology study requirement.
Speaker 1: That sounds terrifying.
Speaker 2: Super scary, But I mean the thing is, that's as
Speaker 2: far as the FDA will go with their internal research.
Speaker 2: Like the agency says it's up to the industry to
Speaker 2: generate the rest of the data.
Speaker 1: So they're basically saying, there's enough of this stuff going
Speaker 1: to your body that you should check if it's toxic,
Speaker 1: but we're not going to pay for that research.
Speaker 2: That's that's pretty much sums it up.
Speaker 1: Oh my god, that is a terrible place to leave consumers,
Speaker 1: especially when you look at the stats right like skin
Speaker 1: cancer rates are so high in the US right now,
Speaker 1: one in five Americans will develop skin cancer by the
Speaker 1: age of seventy. This year, the American Cancer Society reported
Speaker 1: that about three point three million Americans were diagnosed with
Speaker 1: skin cancer, and each year that number is increasing.
Speaker 2: Yeah, but this misinformation about Quote Kim sunscreens was so
Speaker 2: bad that the FDA had to issue its own caveat.
Speaker 2: Like the statement they put out says, while research indicates
Speaker 2: that some topical drugs can be absorbed into the body
Speaker 2: through the skin, this does not mean these drugs are unsafe,
Speaker 2: but this finding does call for further testing to determine
Speaker 2: the safety of repeated use.
Speaker 1: It's such a messy statement after making a mess of
Speaker 1: it to begin with. But one thing I think is
Speaker 1: weird is that it almost feels like the attitude towards
Speaker 1: sunscreen and sun protection is that they're luxury products. And
Speaker 1: this is what I was getting to with the AOC
Speaker 1: stuff that you know, it feels like these are only
Speaker 1: things that you need if you're spending time on a yacht.
Speaker 1: But of course that's not true. And when you think
Speaker 1: about people who regularly work in the sun, like farm
Speaker 1: workers and people who do manual labor outdoors, whether that's
Speaker 1: construction or landscaping or whatever, it really affects everyone. So
Speaker 1: I'd love to hear, like, what is some practical advice here?
Speaker 1: How do we stay safe.
Speaker 2: Well, Dylan actually has the right idea as always. I
Speaker 2: mean when does Dylan not have the right idea. So
Speaker 2: staying out of the sun is key, and you can
Speaker 2: do it with hats and clothes that now have SPF
Speaker 2: ratings and of course parasols. And so we already talked
Speaker 2: about using sunscreens that have an SPF of thirty or higher,
Speaker 2: and a lot of dermatologists advocate to sticking to fifty
Speaker 2: or higher. But SPF doesn't matter if you're not applying
Speaker 2: the sunscreen correctly. So an adult body in a bathing
Speaker 2: suit typically needs at least one liquid ounce or what
Speaker 2: fills your palm applied every two hours or after you
Speaker 2: swim or sweat a lot, and make sure it is
Speaker 2: not expired.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I always forget that a sunscreen can actually expire.
Speaker 1: And what if I've already built up my base tan.
Speaker 2: Well, I think you have a natural based tand because
Speaker 2: of your skin color. But for those who think a
Speaker 2: base tan from the sun or a tanning bed will
Speaker 2: protect your body from the sun, a quote base tan
Speaker 2: is actually sun damage. It's your body producing melanin to
Speaker 2: try to protect itself from more UV rays penetrating deeper
Speaker 2: into your skin. Besides, a base tan only provides an
Speaker 2: SPF of around say five.
Speaker 1: Which is less than olive oil.
Speaker 2: At eight, it is exactly less than olive oil. You're right,
Speaker 2: and you're better off slathering yourself in delicious olive oil
Speaker 2: for sun protection than trying to build a base tan,
Speaker 2: if you want to put it that way.
Speaker 1: Well, I'm waiting for the FDA to approve an olive
Speaker 1: oil sunscreen, but you know, gives me safe sun protection
Speaker 1: but also tastes great. Drizzled over sliced tomatoes.
Speaker 2: Love olive oil so much it's weird. I didn't expect
Speaker 2: to be hungry talking about US sunscreen. Well, one other
Speaker 2: thing to think about is that there's still a lot
Speaker 2: of debate on all of this. The standards we're talking
Speaker 2: about are really American notions. But there's an article in
Speaker 2: the Atlantic by Rowan Jacobsen who talks about how Australia
Speaker 2: has really changed on this issue. Australia has by far
Speaker 2: the world's highest skin care answer rate. So in the
Speaker 2: nineteen eighties they launched this campaign of quote slip slop
Speaker 2: slap and it was basically as big as our just
Speaker 2: Say No campaign in the US, and the idea was
Speaker 2: to promote protection from the sun. Slip on a shirt,
Speaker 2: slop on some sunscreen, and slap on a hat. It's
Speaker 2: just so much fun to say, slip, slap, slap. Yeah. Yeah,
Speaker 2: but keeping people out of the sun wasn't the answer,
Speaker 2: because sunlight has all these benefits that a vitamin D
Speaker 2: pill doesn't give you, including protecting from things like MS
Speaker 2: and diabetes. Anyway, recently the country has revised their sun
Speaker 2: protection advice according to skin color and susceptibility to skin cancer. So,
Speaker 2: according to this same piece, for those with pale skin
Speaker 2: or olive skin plus other risk factors, practice extreme caution,
Speaker 2: keep slip slop slapping.
Speaker 1: For those with.
Speaker 2: Olive oil or pale brown skin, take a balanced approach,
Speaker 2: using sun screen whenever the UV index is at least
Speaker 2: a three, which is most days of the year in Australia. Actually,
Speaker 2: and for those with dark skin, you really only need
Speaker 2: sunscreen for extended outings in the bright sun. So it's
Speaker 2: a more complicated approach, but it's one of the country's
Speaker 2: health officials actually stand by.
Speaker 1: I guess that makes sense that it doesn't have to
Speaker 1: be this one size fits all approach. Yeah, and this
Speaker 1: whole thing is so wordy and so mush to think about.
Speaker 1: But you know, one thing we don't have to think
Speaker 1: a lot about is whether or not to end this
Speaker 1: on a fact off.
Speaker 2: Let's do it, all right, So here's one to kick
Speaker 2: us off. Kristin Little has the Guinness record for most
Speaker 2: spray tans in one hour. That's not a record I
Speaker 2: would have thought about where she got one hundred and
Speaker 2: seven spray tans. Apparently she wasn't just doing it for
Speaker 2: the glow up. Kristin is in the spray tanning business
Speaker 2: and did this stunt to raise awareness for skin cancer
Speaker 2: and also to fundraise for a local cancer center.
Speaker 1: I feel like that's a very different type of dunking
Speaker 1: booth than most of the year. So, speaking of fake tan's,
Speaker 1: we've all heard about how Richard Nixon lost the election
Speaker 1: to Kennedy because of how pale and sweaty he looked
Speaker 1: on TV during those debates. But one thing I'd never
Speaker 1: heard before was that JFK's ten wasn't natural. According to
Speaker 1: David Halberstam's reporting, JFK's appearance was the result of his
Speaker 1: experimenting with Man ten, the first self tanning lotion.
Speaker 2: I would have no idea that that existed at the
Speaker 2: time of JFK being around. That's wild. Well, did you
Speaker 2: know that even when you're dead, your body can keep tanning?
Speaker 2: According to a twenty twenty three paper in the American
Speaker 2: Journal of Forensic Medicine and Pathology, quote, post mortem tanning
Speaker 2: is very much a thing. The paper actually describes and
Speaker 2: analyzes three bodies from different climates had been left in
Speaker 2: the sun and showed tan lines from the exposure after death.
Speaker 1: That is so weird and so morbid, But I guess
Speaker 1: it's good to know. Like, if you have a dead relative,
Speaker 1: you can send them to a tanning booth before a funeral.
Speaker 2: Yeah, oh, good call.
Speaker 1: So here's a weird one from that GEO. To protect
Speaker 1: itself from the sun, the West African lungfish goes into estivation,
Speaker 1: or a summer version of hibernation, where it bundles itself
Speaker 1: in a cocoon of mucus and then digs itself into
Speaker 1: the mud.
Speaker 2: That's one way for us to handle it next time
Speaker 2: we go to the beach. All right, Well, according to Vox,
Speaker 2: higher spfs will give you more protection. In a study
Speaker 2: published in twenty seventeen, two hundred people in Vail, Colorado,
Speaker 2: applied SPF fifty Son's Green to one side of their
Speaker 2: face and SPF one hundred to the other. I sort
Speaker 2: of love this study, And so the next day, forty
Speaker 2: one percent of them were sunburned on their SPF fifty
Speaker 2: side compared to fourteen percent on their SPF one hundred side.
Speaker 1: I love that pretty great. So I think it's pretty
Speaker 1: easy for us all to take the sun for granted,
Speaker 1: especially in the summertime. But there's a group of kids,
Speaker 1: the so called children of the Night, who no amount
Speaker 1: of sunscreen can help because they're allergic to the sun.
Speaker 1: And Atlas Obscura writes about them and describes the phenomena.
Speaker 1: It's called zeroderma pigmentosum. And this phenomena actually makes summer
Speaker 1: camp or any daytime activity painful and even fatally dangerous.
Speaker 1: But luckily, since nineteen ninety five, there's a place called
Speaker 1: Camps Sundown in Prairieville, New York, and it's been catering
Speaker 1: to these kids and it really lets them reclaim the summer.
Speaker 1: They get to do night swims, flashlight tag late night movies,
Speaker 1: and campfires, which all takes place under the glow of
Speaker 1: the moonlight.
Speaker 2: That is so sweet. It's such a great idea you
Speaker 2: have and did it with the sweetest facts. So I
Speaker 2: think I'm gonna have to give you this week's trophy, Mango.
Speaker 1: Thank you so much, and I'm gonna grab it from
Speaker 1: your slippery sunscreeny hands before we head out. Please remember
Speaker 1: we love hearing from you, but more importantly, our moms
Speaker 1: love hearing from you, and you can always hit us
Speaker 1: up with questions and comments at our mom's email address,
Speaker 1: keyty Genius Moms at gmail dot com. And that is
Speaker 1: it for this week's episode from Will, Dylan, Mary, and myself.
Speaker 1: Thank you so much for listening. Part Time Genius is
Speaker 1: a production of Kaleidoscope and iHeartRadio. This show is hosted
Speaker 1: by Will Pearson and me Mongagetikler and research by our
Speaker 1: good pal Mary Philip Sandy. Today's episode was engineered and
Speaker 1: produced by the one Wonderful of Dylan Fagan with support
Speaker 1: from Tyler Klang. The show is executive produced for iHeart
Speaker 1: by Katrina Norvel and Ali Perry, with social media support
Speaker 1: from Sasha Gay trustee Dara Potts and Viney Shorey. For
Speaker 1: more podcasts from Kaleidoscope and iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app,
Speaker 1: Apple podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.