There's No Such Thing as a Safe Tan (theconversation.com) 148
H. Peter Soyer, Professor of Dermatology, and Katie Lee, Research assistant at The University of Queensland, write: There's a lot to be said for sunshine -- both good and bad. It's our main source of vitamin D, which is essential for bone and muscle health. Populations with higher levels of sun exposure also have better blood pressure and mood levels, and fewer autoimmune diseases such as multiple sclerosis. On the other hand, excess UV exposure is estimated to contribute to 95% of melanomas and 99% of non-melanoma skin cancers. These skin cancers account for a whopping 80% of all new cancers each year in Australia.
Like any medicine, the dose counts. And in Australia, particularly in the summer, our dose of UV is so high that even short incidental exposures -- like while you hang out the washing or walk from your carpark into the shops -- adds up to huge lifetime doses. Fortunately, when it comes to tanning, the advice is clear: don't. A UV dose that's high enough to induce a tan is already much higher than the dose needed for vitamin D production. A four-year-long study of 1,113 people in Nambour, Queensland, found no difference in vitamin D levels between sunscreen users and sunscreen avoiders. Further reading: Is Sunscreen the New Margarine?
Like any medicine, the dose counts. And in Australia, particularly in the summer, our dose of UV is so high that even short incidental exposures -- like while you hang out the washing or walk from your carpark into the shops -- adds up to huge lifetime doses. Fortunately, when it comes to tanning, the advice is clear: don't. A UV dose that's high enough to induce a tan is already much higher than the dose needed for vitamin D production. A four-year-long study of 1,113 people in Nambour, Queensland, found no difference in vitamin D levels between sunscreen users and sunscreen avoiders. Further reading: Is Sunscreen the New Margarine?
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No sife ten? Not fer Strayleans.
Tanned people are better mates? (Score:4, Interesting)
Your analogy is accurate-- about the only thing that never seems to have evidence Fads turning like a wind-vane in a twister is coffee. Coffee is just good for you.
One thing that makes me suspect that tans are not so bad is that it's often the case that sexual attractivness is also an indicator of health or wealth or success --- that is, the general suitability of a mate for enhanced fitness.
We go to great lengths in fact to look better than we are!
And generally, on white folks, a glowing tan is considered attractive, just as a healthy flush in the cheeks is more attractive than a goth palor or a crimson palor.
So if a Tan is such a leading indicator, it might be rooted in biological fitness. That might not mean health-- it might mean your mate is an active hunter not a cave surfer--but I'd bet on health as the indication it forecasts. IN modern times, tans also are indicators of Leisure and therefore wealth, but historically that wasn't the case-- rich folks were a whiter shade of pale to specifically not be farmer-tanned.
that is, how can something that looks good be bad? Surely many ways but there's a rule of thumb here.
il Cheeto (Score:2, Interesting)
Our fake president certainly fakes his Tan too. And he does it because he think it makes him more powerful and vigorous, so even he gets this signaling association that Tans are markers of powerful mates.
Re:Tanned people are better mates? (Score:5, Insightful)
I agree this is the right way to be thinking about this. You need to look at the evolutionary background of homo sapiens and consider that whenever you are evaluating what is healthy and what is not.
The problem I see is that it is a system with many complex inputs. Controlled experiments are impossible in most cases. But you can tease out usable conclusions nonetheless.
In the case of sunlight/UV it is pretty clear you need it within some range. Both zero exposure and high exposure (say naked in Death Valley in July with no shade) can be pretty easily be shown to be unhealthy.
But the real problem are variables that are often totally ignored in reports like this. Is the body's Vitamin A store/supply important? What about K2? What about many other micro nutrients or for that matter the condition of the immune system that suppresses cancer cells being generated all the time in the body?
There is a big difference (besides genetics) between a bushman who eats wild game to survive (including most of the animal) and other high-nutrient sources and the surfer dude that scarfs down fast-food burgers and fries and HFCS sodas before heading to the beach.
So when I read something like "THE ADVICE IS CLEAR: DON'T" without considering what a thousand generations of humans survived and flourished on what I actually see is an "authority" with very incomplete view of things and whose advice on anything but the obvious can be disregarded.
Re: Tanned people are better mates? (Score:1)
Eh, the cancer connection is clear. People in the past didn't thrive under UV exposure. If they were lucky to live long enough they would probably easily get skin cancer.
It's like saying it is not clear you should not smoke because humanity survived fine when smoking was common.
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PS. I live in a rural area and my local medical clinic runs a separate skin clinic aimed at diagnosing skin cancers. I see a lot of the "bushman" types, and farmers in there.
That is interesting. Proximity to the ozone hole is of course a variable to be considered.
A tan used to be UNATTRACTIVE (Score:5, Interesting)
When the working class was busy toiling in the fields, a tan was considered quite unkempt among the upper echelons.
Now that the working class are stuck in cubicles, a tan is considered quite robust among the upper echelons.
Similarly, being thicker used to be more attractive, because it meant you could eat well. Walking in ridiculous shoes, and having impractically long nails is still considered attractive, because it means you don't have to do any sort of practical labor—not because working is viewed as a bad thing, but rather because most other people cannot afford to maintain those absurdities and thus it makes you stand out.
It's cool to support mass migration, because it means you get to live in a segregated, gated community that is unaffected by the growing presence of the 3rd world in your neighborhood.
CAPTCHA: Upkeep
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Re:Tanned people are better mates? (Score:4, Insightful)
Yes, but tan as an attractive trait is relatively new, really only coming to be in the mid 1900's.
In most of the world, lighter skin is more fashionable. Go shopping in Asia or Latin America, and you will see shelves full of skin lightening products.
Even in America, tanning is done more for fashion than beauty. The point of fashion is not to attract a mate, but to signal status. A woman carries an LV handbag to raise her status among other women, not because men find it attractive. If anything, a man will think that she is either self absorbed and high maintenance, or that she already has a rich husband/boyfriend. Likewise, when men describe what they find attractive in a woman, "a good tan" is generally not mentioned.
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Yes, but tan as an attractive trait is relatively new, really only coming to be in the mid 1900's.
In most of the world, lighter skin is more fashionable.
It's pretty much ingrained in the genetic beauty ideals of the human race. Skin darkens with age. Lighter skin is indicative of youth. Being turned on by a young woman gives the prospect of a mate that will live longer and bear you more young. Almost all of traits that we typically consider attractive relate to either youth, health, or fertility for the same reasons.
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A tan being attractive is just a short term cultural preference of recent origin. For a much longer time, a tan was associated with lower class people who worked outdoors and pale white skin was preferred among the rich and powerful.
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For a much longer time, a tan was associated with lower class people who worked outdoors
Today, a tan signals that you can afford a tropical vacation in the winter.
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And generally, on white folks, a glowing tan is considered attractive, just as a healthy flush in the cheeks is more attractive than a goth palor or a crimson palor.
This statement is true today. It was not true in earlier generations.
What is attractive is the appearance you get by not doing the common labor of the day. So pre-industrialization, pale was attractive. Because it meant you weren't spending your time outside laboring. A goth palor was the look of wealth.
Today, most people work inside. So tan is attractive, because most (non-dark-skinned) people do not naturally get tan from their jobs, it's the look of people who have enough free time to get tan. Agai
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Nature also doesn't care much beyond a person reproducing and raising their offspring to the point where they can successfully reproduce. There is some value in raising the grandchildren as well, but I wonder how much nature cares about a person past ~50, maybe 60.
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And back when being wealthy meant that you could stay inside instead of work out in a field all day every day, being pasty white was considered attractive.
At the moment, though, having the spare time and money to get a nice tan is (somewhat) of an indicator of wealth, so it's "attractive." Except to guys like me that know what the girl will look like after 20 years of tanning vs. the ones that don't have a tan now. The beautifully tanned 20 year olds of today are the looks-50-but-are-only-30s of tomorrow.
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So if a Tan is such a leading indicator, it might be rooted in biological fitness.
It's not. It's one of those beauty indicators that changes in favorability over generations. One group of people might think a tan is great, and another group might think it's not great. It's not based in biology.
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Interesting enough, I just read an article on how getting more sun is proving to be extremely beneficial, and that a lot of the cardiac issues darker skins folks have are likely caused by their skin blocking the sun!
https://www.outsideonline.com/... [outsideonline.com]
It appears that the risk of death by skin cancer for too much sun is overwhelmed by the risk of cardiac issues from too little.
Money quotes "People with low levels of vitamin D in their blood have significantly higher rates of virtually every disease and disorde
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That said this is cultural, as not everyone can or wants to be be orange. In many parts of the world being orange is not a sign of prestige. In fact, a tan for white w
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I doubt evolution has had much effect on humans since Tudor times. Anything since the invention of writing is modern on evolutionary timescales.
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But while there are probably a few traits that we're wired to find attractive, many are based on social queues. Generally, whatever is harder to achieve.
Today, where many work indoors and food is plentiful, the standard is thin and tan. In the past when food was expensive and most worked outdoors, the standard was plump and pale.
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Except that healthy tans are not healthy. We've known this for a long time. Standards of beauty change over time and across culture, there is almost no beauty characteristic that is universal, except for appearing young and appearing wealthy. There is far more culture involved than biology.
Even if biology was a factor, do not fall into the trap of assuming instincts are always right. Evolution does not work that way, most of the time evolution does not lead to more advanced organisms or even organisms t
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Your analogy is accurate-- about the only thing that never seems to have evidence Fads turning like a wind-vane in a twister is coffee. Coffee is just good for you.
One thing that makes me suspect that tans are not so bad is that it's often the case that sexual attractivness is also an indicator of health or wealth or success --- that is, the general suitability of a mate for enhanced fitness.
We go to great lengths in fact to look better than we are!
And generally, on white folks, a glowing tan is considered attractive, just as a healthy flush in the cheeks is more attractive than a goth palor or a crimson palor.
So if a Tan is such a leading indicator, it might be rooted in biological fitness. That might not mean health-- it might mean your mate is an active hunter not a cave surfer--but I'd bet on health as the indication it forecasts. IN modern times, tans also are indicators of Leisure and therefore wealth, but historically that wasn't the case-- rich folks were a whiter shade of pale to specifically not be farmer-tanned.
that is, how can something that looks good be bad? Surely many ways but there's a rule of thumb here.
This is entirely a cultural thing, nothing to do with biology.
Tans are considered attractive in western societies, a darker skin colour amongst white people is indicative of people having spent time in the sun enjoying themselves. Especially here in Norther European nations where the sun is something we dont see a lot of for over half the year.
If you take a look at asian cultures, look at the celebrities, the models... they're all the colour of porcelain. In most Asian cultures dark skin colour is an
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You also have terrible coffee almost everywhere - well made, good coffee is difficult to find (found a couple of places in NYC & San Fran, and just the one in Hawai'i) .
For me, I've already had 2 unsweetened *instant* coffees and it's not yet 9am here. I'll be head
Not a problem for Slashdot readers! (Score:1)
Monitor tans for the best life quality
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Monitor tans for the best life quality
Not anymore. In the olden days, CRTs generated some UV light. But modern LCD and OLED monitors emit none.
Totally rigged tan, believe me!...and good (Score:3, Funny)
What about the spray-on tan that you-know-who uses?
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Snooki for President! Make Orange Great Again!
Spray tans are paint (Score:3)
What about the spray-on tan that you-know-who uses?
Spray on "tan" isn't a tan. It's paint. Spray "tans" are tans in the same sense that soy milk is really juice. They only call it a tan because it superficially resembles one to someone who isn't looking very carefully.
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They only call it a tan because it superficially resembles one
That's what the tell the emperor, at any rate.
Vocab cat fight! [Re:Spray tans are paint] (Score:1)
Terms like "tan" have no official definition definer. The general population is who controls definitions, for good or bad. If the population calls it a "tan", it's a tan.
I've done no official surveys on this word regarding this matter, but neither have you. However, my gut impression is that a fake tan is usually considered a sub-category of "tan".
Companies like Websters (dictionary makers) may influence definitions, but still they are not the final arbiters. There are
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You are right, I should have said "spray tan".
Misplaced pedantics (Score:2)
Terms like "tan" have no official definition definer.
Not true. The word tan does have a medical definition [wikipedia.org]. The word tan is used for other purposes as well but in this context when doctors are talking about there being no safe amount of tanning they are talking about the skin's reaction to UV light and the color changes that result. You can give superficially similar results by literally painting (staining) the skin with chemicals but that is a VERY different thing and if you looked at the skin up close the difference is obvious. Calling spray tans a "ta
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The speaker controls what they are intending to talk about, but whether listeners will understand or agree on a definition or point is another matter.
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Spray on "tan" isn't a tan. It's paint.
No, it's a stain. Much like what tanners use.
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"Tan" is also a color. Like saying "spray-on beige".
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And I'd like to point out that Ronald Regan had a lot of nasty things said about him by his detractors when he was in office too.
It seems to me that moral depravity is kind of a prerequisite for holding public office these days anyway. You simply have to be willing to mislead voters over your true intentions to get elected. First, you have to play to your party's radicals (be they right or left) and win the primary, THEN you have to steer a centrist path in the general to gain the votes from the middle t
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Quite a lot of Reagan's detractors also liked Reagan. He and Tip O'Neill were friends. They worked together despite being opposites on most issues. This was in the days when politicians knew the difference between "I don't agree with you" and "I don't like you."
Also, Reagan had a completely different personality from Trump.
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Yea, but that doesn't make Trump totally bad, just deferment in some ways and the same in others. Trump has good points, one of the biggest is his propensity to actually attempt to make good on his campaign promises.
My point is, political detractors generally say the same kinds of things about their opponents depending on their party affiliation. Many say bad things about Trump and a lot of what they say is politically driven. Word of advice... IF you have a source that critiques Trump, but never acknowled
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The problem with Trump, like most candidates, making campaign promises is that there is an unfounded assumption that he will have the capability of carrying through on the promise. Most of these promises assume that the office holder has unlimited power to do things, whether president, or merely a mayor. Most voters understand this also, so when candidates make promises we realize that we're not to take these as sincere promises that will be kept at any cost, instead we know that they're indicators that th
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What about the spray-on tan that you-know-who uses?
No, and he's healthy as a horse...
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... and by "a horse", I mean "Barbaro after the 2006 Preakness"...
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You know who doesn't use a spray-on, it's clear from the pattern of pale around his eyes that he's using a tanning booth with tanning bed goggles.
Compare to Boehner, who in some photos seems to have that same shade that seems somewhat unnatural in some lighting conditions. But he doesn't have the tanning lines around the eyes because he gets it from behind outside a lot. You-know-who golfs a lot, more than his predecessors so I wonder why he doesn't have a more natural looking tan from it. Maybe he has s
Just Rub Yourself in Cheeto Powder (Score:1, Funny)
If it's good enough for the President of the most ridiculous country on Earth, it ought to be good enough for you!
Keep this in perspective (Score:5, Insightful)
But... (Score:4, Funny)
What if my car is a convertible!?
Don't use sunscreen much (Score:2)
Just like you buckle your seat belt when riding in a car, use sunscreen when going outdoors.
That is actually bad advice, because then you are not getting nearly so much advantage of the exposure in producing vitamin D.
If you are just outside an hour or two, going in and out of the sun and/or mostly clothed, just don't worry about about it.
Just use sunscreen to prevent actual burns, not just because the sun will be on you...
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For reference the U.V. Index in Brisbane today was 14.
That's a pasty nerd to ball of blistering skin in about 5 minutes.
Or put another way, according to the World Cancer Research Fund
The United States has a skin cancer rate of 12.7 per 100,000 people.
Australia has a rate of 33.6 per 100,000 people.
It's a little different down there.
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Australian Sun advice does not conform to the rest of the world, much like most of Australia.
The average UV index for the entire country in the second month of summer (for them January, now) goes from an index of 11 to 14 and is literally off the charts for the North America index of 0 to 11. Nevada and New Mexico average a 10 at the peak of summer. Australian sun is a totally different beast from our pansy northern hemisphere equivalent.
Welcome to the information a
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The happy fact is that DNA does repair itself and the time you spend in the sun at age 8 likely is not going to contribute to the transcription errors that will cause the cancer that kills you at age 97.
I don't know the layout of Australian malls and carparks but if it is anything like here in the states no it really isn't going to add up. On closer inspection maybe it does add up (just for them) that be
Correlation is NOT causation (Score:2, Insightful)
The incidence of historical melanoma should be considered. Highly considered. As humans, historically we spent a very large amount of time working outdoors in the sunlight. Yet when we do so today, we get cancer? Wait, then what has changed? Why would evolution deselect a protective measure like this? Is it evolution or is it something else?
Diet? Pollutants? Stress? Alternative radiation exposure (radio transmissions, microwaves, CRTs)?
What is the reason, not the result, what is the cause, not the symptom.
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The T-Rex ate you long before you caught a bad case of the Cancer.
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Once you're old enough to breed, evolution is done with you.
Ancient people didn't typically live long enough to get cancer.
Cue the guy to claim is was 'all infant mortality'. He is wrong.
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We've dug up an awful lot of ancient graves by now. 'No idea' is overstating the case, by a lot.
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'No idea' is exactly how much clue we have about ancient skin cancer rates. Skin does not tend to be found on skeletons thousands of years old, certainly not in sufficient quantity for a statistical projection.
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Metastases on/in bone left marks. There isn't a ton of data, but 'no idea' is bullshit.
We also know average age at death and cancer rates vs age in modern primitive populations.
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Once you're old enough to breed, evolution is done with you.
Evolution doesn't reward individuals, it rewards genes. Evolution continues rewarding the genes you passed on while you're still a net benefit to the survival and reproductive rate of your descendants.
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Really? So long as you were all enough to breed, evolution was done with you? Pop out that new born, kick the bucket and let that baby raise itself?
If you actually look at it with a scientific eye, it looks like humans live long enough to breed, raise their offspring, and very frequently help raise their offsprings offspring. This seems to have maximized the survival of our children.
You might consider looking in to how "survival of the fittest" actually works. I'll give you a hint, anything that helps t
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Untrue, children have to be raised, and after that, grandchildren. You're not an evolutionary success just because you breed; your descendants must live and breed themselves.
Yes, he is. But not completely. A man in ancient times could reasonably hope to live until his 60s or 70s if he survived childhood, which was terribly dangerous, which dragged life expectancy down. As the Bib
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There are a lot of people who don't really understand evolution and try to shoehorn in a lot of ideas about evolution that don't fit. Such as "what is the evolutionary purpose of grandparents", or other silly things. They assume evolution is about a progression from lesser organisms towards higher organisms and eventually towards perfection, as if evolution is just intelligent design with more science. Also there is often the incorrect assumption that as humans we are at the endpoint of evolution; or that
Tanning (Score:5, Interesting)
All tans are caused by damage, but not all tans are equal. There are three types of tan:
* Immediate pigment darkening: Rapid onset. Somewhat grayish appearance. Mostly gone within an hour.
* Persistent pigment darkening: Peaks within a couple hours. Mostly gone a day or so afterwards.
* Delayed tanning: Peaks after 4-7 days. Can take over a month to fully disappear.
Most tanning beds use UVA, which penetrates deeper into the skin. It causes all three forms of tanning, although the delayed tanning is not as strong as with UVB. Relative to the "therapeutic" dose, UVA tends to cause the most damage to the skin (UVB is more damaging per joule, but you use significantly less)
UVB (and UVC, although nobody uses that) also causes tanning. It's not generally used in tanning beds because it also causes sunburn (UVA, particularly UVA2, can also cause sunburn, but it's not as prone to as UVB). A particular target region however is NB-UVB (narrowband), which only has 10-20% of the sunburn risk as BB-UVB (broadband, aka, the whole UVB spectrum). UVB does not penetrate as deeply into the skin as UVA. A "therapeutic" NB-UVB dose may cause mild erythema (reddening), but no immediate darkening. This then transitions to a strong delayed tanning response. UVB tans do more to protect against further sunburn than UVA tans.
An argument can be made for switching from UVA tanning to NB-UVB tanning. But one should be clear, both damage the skin. There are medical applications for UVA or NB-UVB exposure (skin conditions like eczema, vitiligo, etc), but vitamin D is not one of them; the safest way to get it is supplements. Indeed, if you only want vitamin D, you don't want either UVA (which contributes virtually nothing) or NB-UVB exposure; you want a band in the 293-300nm region, where vitamin D synthesis is at a maximum. You can use several orders of magnitude less power than you'd use for a NB-UVB tan (and even less still vs. a UVA tan) - just a couple dozen milliwatts per square meter - and still produce daily doses of vitamin D in minutes.
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By the way, all the recent studies are showing that vitamin D supplements to not give health benefits. It looks like the sun exposure was causing the benefits, so taking away the exposure and replacing it with supplements doesn't work.
https://www.outsideonline.com/... [outsideonline.com]
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Indeed, light has a lot of effects on the body beyond just D synthesis. When I first heard about phototherapy my reaction was, "Yeah, what a bunch of new-age hippie BS." After spending a lot of time reading peer-reviewed papers on the subject, I'm completely sold. Light has a lot of effects on the body. It's amazing the number of conditions that react to it - some beyond just the spot that's exposed (for example, the immunosuppressive effect of UV - which is actually good in many circumstances, when deal
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It's all about your environment. If it's the middle of winter, you need more sun time than the middle of summer, assuming you're not close to the equator of course
Vitamin D (Score:4, Interesting)
A four-year-long study of 1,113 people in Nambour, Queensland, found no difference in vitamin D levels between sunscreen users and sunscreen avoiders.
I wonder how they controlled external sources of Vitamin D. Everything from milk to cheese, breakfast cereal, orange juice, etc, as been fortified with Vitamin D. People in developed countries do not need sunlight for their Vitamin D. I don't think anyone would expect a person using sunscreen would have lower than normal vitamin D levels. If the study was not properly controlled, all it may have proven is that non-sunscreen users don't have elevated vitamin D levels.
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People in developed countries do not need sunlight for their Vitamin D.
They may not need it for Vitamin D, but they do need it. The largest, most extensive study on Vitamin D supplements was just concluded a few months ago, and despite the fact that we know from prior research that people with better Vitamin D levels are significantly healthier (e.g. heart, cancer, etc.), the study found that there was no discernible benefit to consuming additional Vitamin D (i.e. Vitamin D levels did not correlate to better health among people taking Vitamin D supplements). The findings seem
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Australian milk generally does not have vitamin D added, as far as I know. At least the usual one I get does not.
You can buy milk with added vitamin D, but I believe it's usually sold with higher calcium milk to aid absorption.
I'm not sure about other foods. I remember being surprised when I lived in the USA a couple years ago that all the milk had vitamin D. (I was diagnosed with a vitamin D deficiency after being there for a few months of Midwest winter!)
Melanoma is also possible without sun (Score:2)
My father-in-law died of melanoma. A tumor which started on the sole of his foot. The only times he was in the sun, was when he gardened (not much), went fishing (which can also be done without sun), and possibly on Sunday mornings when he went playing with the finches.
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Indeed, it appears that the most dangerous forms of skin cancer are not typically caused by the sun. Sun induced cancers tend to be easy to treat.
Sorry to hear about your father-in-law.
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When you're in the sun, you're damaging those cells *increasing* the chance of the damaged cells mutating into the above.
The sun isn't the sole cause.
Oh, look, everyone! (Score:5, Informative)
Be sure to check back next week, when we'll see the absolute opposite posted by someone else clickbait!
What I'd really like to know (Score:2, Insightful)
Did you want an answer? (Score:1)
Melanoma is much higher frequency amongst Nordic decedents. People who are from places nearer the equator have much lower frequency, but still get it.
Take a Nordic person, put them in Australia in the sun all day and you get melanoma. Most Australians descended from the UK which were highly mixed with Vikings. Up in Norway, not enough sunlight, so they evolved just fine for where they were. Move them around and you get it.
I believe Australia has some of the highest melanoma rates in the world.
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There are at least 2 factors that may have come in play.
1: Lower life expectancy meant not enough time for cancer to develop.
2: Until the 1940s, the planet had not been irradiated, though plenty of other poisons had already been dumped into the environment by then.
That's just my guess.
IDDD (aka ID3 aka I Don't Do Disclaimers)
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We had fur. That's a problem with evolution: we started using clothes (to be warmer), and with global warming then fur wasn't needed and removed.
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Also, just because people were outside more doesn't mean that they ran around naked all the time. There are plenty of parts of the world where you'd freeze to death before having to worry about skin cancer. Whe
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As for Australia (Score:1)
Margarine (Score:3)
Thanks for the link. (Score:2)
How do we fix the problem? (Score:2)
And... Why do "white" people want to be black?
Or, maybe we need to find a new planet. I'm tired of all the news about Trump, such as: In 710 days, President Trump has made 7,645 false or misleading claims [washingtonpost.com].
The real solution: Take vitamin pills every day? Vitamins A, D, E, and K are not soluble in water [verywellhealth.com], so there is an upper limit to how much you should take.
No such thing as Safe Air (Score:2)
You know what air contains? Oxygen! That stuff is a serious oxidant. Perhaps only more dangerous if mixed with hydrogen to create H2O - immersion in which will KILL you in minutes!
See? You can make a scare story from anything. Sure, there's no such thing as a safe tan. There's no such thing as a safe life either but I bet H. Peter Soyer ain't planning on suicide any time soon.
PSA from the 80's Slip, Slop, Slap! (Score:2)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]
Slip on a shirt,
Slop on the 50+ sunscreen,
Slap on a hat,
Seek shade or shelter,
Slide on some glasses used to block out sun
And come back Norm .. we miss you!
From the 'further reading' article (Score:5, Insightful)
"So Lindqvist decided to look at overall mortality rates, and the results were shocking. Over the 20 years of the study, sun avoiders were twice as likely to die as sun worshippers.
There are not many daily lifestyle choices that double your risk of dying. In a 2016 study published in the Journal of Internal Medicine, Lindqvist’s team put it in perspective: “Avoidance of sun exposure is a risk factor of a similar magnitude as smoking, in terms of life expectancy.”"
And also:
"Melanoma, the deadly type of skin cancer, is much rarer, accounting for only 1 to 3 percent of new skin cancers. And perplexingly, outdoor workers have half the melanoma rate of indoor workers. Tanned people have lower rates in general. “The risk factor for melanoma appears to be intermittent sunshine and sunburn, especially when you’re young,” says Weller. “But there’s evidence that long-term sun exposure associates with less melanoma.”"
So regardless of whether you believe sun is bad for your or not, I rather think saying "the advice is clear" is so abjectly wrong, you should probably take everything else that's said with a huge grain of salt. There is almost never completely clear advice when it comes to things like thins.
Re: (Score:2)
That's really interesting—and it further undermines the advice that getting a tan is bad for you. Just don't get a tan all at once, and try not to burn. Generally good advice.
There is a magic - clinuvel (Score:1)
Safe TAN (Score:2)