Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Newer, better sunscreens have not been approved by the FDA

theatlantic.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

141–150 of 201 posts

Re: Newer, better sunscreens have not been approved by the FDA

#141

Post by robocat »

dhzhzjsbevs wrote: post #136
culi wrote: post #110

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Actually Australia had it the worst. I remember estimates that the MAJORITY of Australians will have had skin cancer in their lifetimes

Excuse you. NZ and Pacific islands had it the worst. Aussie sun is a joke compared to NZ sun.

The ozone hole is scary, and certainly anecdotally it feels like it severely affected UV levels, however apparently the science says the hole didn’t actually affect UV in NZ very much: “While the ozone hole does not directly affect ozone concentrations over New Zealand, when it breaks up in spring it can send ‘plumes’ of ozone-depleted air towards us. This briefly decreases column ozone levels by around 5 percent, about the same amount as normal daily variation (Ajtić et al, 2004).”[1]. I read that a 5% decrease in column ozone leads to a 2.5% increase in UV, which is not that significant.

Personally I believe the NZ sun is harsh, but looking at country measurements shows UV levels in NZ are not as bad as we might think.

That said, as a NZer, I am extremely pleased that everyone banned ozone depleting chemicals.

[1] https://www.stats.govt.nz/indicators/ozone-hole/

Re: Newer, better sunscreens have not been approved by the FDA

#142

Post by thematrixturtle »

culi wrote: post #110
adastra22 wrote: post #95

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In Argentina.

Actually Australia had it the worst. I remember estimates that the MAJORITY of Australians will have had skin cancer in their lifetimes

That's not an estimate, that's reality: 2/3rds of Australian will get some form of skin cancer.

https://www.sunsmart.com.au/skin-cancer/skin-cancer-facts-st...

It's not quite as dramatic as that sounds though, because the really dangerous type (melanoma) has "only" ~5% incidence.

Re: Newer, better sunscreens have not been approved by the FDA

#143

Post by akdor1154 »

SOLAR_FIELDS wrote: post #65
jakub_g wrote: post #12

*in US. Honestly, I was expecting an article about some ingredients being harmful to coral reef hence disallowed, or similar. Instead, the issue is slow process of FDA. > The FDA hasn’t added a new active ingredient to its sunscreen monograph [...] in decades. Also, what makes this article interesting (a "man bites a dog" kind of story) is that the US is more strict than EU in this area; in 95% of cases for all kinds…

The other wild portion of this is that if you go to northern EU (Norway/Sweden/Finland) sunscreen is like, insanely expensive. Like at least triple the price of what you would pay in the states for the same product.

Man.. i should start trading aus sunscreen for finnish mozzie repellent. Any finns into global small-scale logistics?

Re: Newer, better sunscreens have not been approved by the FDA

#144

Post by 2-718-281-828 »

copperx wrote: post #116
jamal-kumar wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is pretty popular with surfers in Central America. Zinc Oxide cream, like what you use for a baby's diaper rash, is WAY cheaper than sunscreen (Priced high for the tourists), and it's pretty much available at any pañalera (diaper store, if you can believe it, more like what you'd call a 'dollar store' up north with the other things they sell anyways - many small towns have one). It just makes you look like a gho…

> Zinc Oxide cream I've wondered about creating my own sunscreen that way, but the internet discouraged me. From what I've read, Zinc Oxide for babies isn't a nanoparticle, it doesn't block the sun efficiently. I haven't had the chance to research it further.

I'm surprised that's what you got from the internet. My internet first and formost warns about nanoparticles in sunscreen.

Re: Newer, better sunscreens have not been approved by the FDA

#145

Post by 2-718-281-828 »

diiaann wrote: post #11

In the article it briefly mentions L’Oreal. They have a patent on another set of filters mexoryl and mexoryl xl, both are great and allowed by the FDA. You can buy it with their La Roche Posay brand.

I'd avoid everything L'Oreal like the plague.

Re: Newer, better sunscreens have not been approved by the FDA

#146

Post by hgomersall »

SOLAR_FIELDS wrote: post #105
medymed wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

One explanation is a time delay. Most typical skin cancers (BCCs and SCCs), like other features of sun damaged skin, tend to arise decades after high levels of chronic or accumulated intermittent sun exposure at a younger age. (However that be less true for melanoma.)

I had two BCC’s at a very young age (26/27). They were almost certainly caused by frequent (1-2x a week) usage of tanning beds for several years in my early 20’s. I stopped using the beds around 24 and besides the two BCC’s at 26 and 27 have not had any issues for a decade. And I know the word “cancer” sounds bad, but it’s very relative. BCC/SCC are very very unlikely to kill you, think of them as an extremely slow g…

BCCs are correlated with longer life expectancy.

Re: Newer, better sunscreens have not been approved by the FDA

#147

Post by masklinn »

jandrese wrote: post #101
icegreentea2 wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Reasonable question. There appears to be a shift in the relative incidence rates based on age since 2000 ( https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamadermatology/fullarticle... ). Skin cancer rates were always weighted towards older (average age at detection is ~65), but at the same time skin cancers are one of the more common cancers found in young people. Since 2000 where appears to be a decrease in incidence of younger…

Are you suggesting that the skin cancer rates are a lagging indicator and the explosion in cases is the result of the lax attitudes of a few decades ago as described in the article? One thing the article didn't mention is that even just 30 years ago sunscreens were nowhere near as effective as they are today. SPF 15 was extremely common and 30 was kinda rare and usually left you looking like you were whitewashed. Tod…

> Are you suggesting that the skin cancer rates are a lagging indicator and the explosion in cases is the result of the lax attitudes of a few decades ago as described in the article?

That seems logical, skin cancer is not a next-day result of overexposure, sunburn is.

Re: Newer, better sunscreens have not been approved by the FDA

#149

Post by herbst »

SOLAR_FIELDS wrote: post #65
jakub_g wrote: post #12

*in US. Honestly, I was expecting an article about some ingredients being harmful to coral reef hence disallowed, or similar. Instead, the issue is slow process of FDA. > The FDA hasn’t added a new active ingredient to its sunscreen monograph [...] in decades. Also, what makes this article interesting (a "man bites a dog" kind of story) is that the US is more strict than EU in this area; in 95% of cases for all kinds…

The other wild portion of this is that if you go to northern EU (Norway/Sweden/Finland) sunscreen is like, insanely expensive. Like at least triple the price of what you would pay in the states for the same product.

Didn't they ban all the chemicals that are easily washed off and hurt the natural environment?

Re: Newer, better sunscreens have not been approved by the FDA

#150

Post by 2-718-281-828 »

SoftTalker wrote: post #14
SnowHill9902 wrote: post #5

How often do people go to the dermatologist to have their moles checked?

Considering most are booked 12-18 months out, if they are even accepting new patients, probably not a lot.

This - same situation in Germany. And they are not booked out b/c they treat so many people with maladies. It's just that most dermatologist are glorified beauticians who can cut and inject. So, they prefer to make rich people more attractive. Usually with a focus on women. Proof: Check out dermatologist websites. They usually advertise themselves on them like the primary product with pictures you'd expect on Tinder but not on a physician's website.
Post reply on HN