by Catherine Ebling, RN, BSN

All the talk of the last decade has been about avoiding the sun and avoiding skin cancer. We slather ourselves with sunscreen full of chemicals and think we are doing the right and prudent thing. After all, who wants prematurely aging skin and melanomas?

Now many health advocates are questioning the safety of total sun avoidance, and study after study now point to the importance of sun exposure and vitamin D. A lack of sunlight can put you at risk for a vitamin D deficiency, and increase your susceptibility to a number of diseases-many of them life-threatening.

Enjoy summer sun safely.

So the dangers of skin cancer and sunscreen versus the benefits of the sun and vitamin D, leave the average American confused about the contradictory messages. Avoiding the sun altogether will protect the skin from aging and some skin cancers, but lead to deficits in vitamin D, which leads to other serious health issues including cancer, heart disease, autoimmune diseases, and depression, to name just a few. Where is the happy medium?

While sunlight is definitely beneficial to us, it is important to recognize the difference between UVA rays and UVB rays. It is primarily the UVA (tanning) rays that are cancer causing, while the UVB (burning) rays stimulate the production of vitamin D in the skin.

When the sun’s UVB rays hit the skin, a reaction takes place that enables skin cells to manufacture vitamin D. If you’re fair skinned, experts say going outside for 10 minutes in the midday sun-in shorts and a tank top with no sunscreen-will give you enough radiation to produce about 10,000 international units of the vitamin.

Dark-skinned individuals and the elderly also produce less vitamin D, and many folks don’t get enough of the nutrient from dietary sources like fatty fish, grass fed beef, and grass-fed or fortified milk.

The government’s dietary recommendations are 200 IU’s a day up to age 50, 400 IU’s to age 70, and 600 IU’s over 70. But many experts believe that these recommendations are far too low to maintain healthful vitamin D levels. They push for supplementation in the winter of about 2,000 IU’s per day and a dose of daily sunshine in the summer.

The sunshine vitamin may protect against a host of diseases, including osteoporosis, heart disease, and cancers of the breast, prostate, and colon. What’s more, sunlight has other hidden benefits-like protecting against depression, insomnia, and an overactive immune system.

Given all the upsides of basking at least briefly in the summer sun, many experts now worry that public-health messages warning about skin cancer have gone overboard in getting people to cover up and seek the shade.

How much sun is safe to get before we start risking skin cancer?

It’s difficult to quantify how much since skin pigmentation affects how much radiation your skin absorbs: The darker the skin, the more it’s protected against skin cancer but the less able it is to absorb UVB rays. It also depends on how much skin is exposed and the time of day. If you’re fair skinned and sunning yourself outside in a bathing suit at noon in the summer, you only need a few minutes without sunscreen. If you’re already tan or of Hispanic origin, you need maybe 15 to 20 minutes. Black skin may require six times the sun exposure to make the same vitamin D levels as a very fair-skinned person, but more research is needed on this.

Despite the long and growing list of sun benefits, the fact remains: too much of the sun’s UVA rays still are a factor in skin cancer. One in five Americans will still get some type of skin cancer in their lifetime, so the threat is still there.

Dermatologists argue the merits of safe sun exposure and push sunscreen, while other natural health experts push no sunscreen and going au naturale in the sun, but modulating the sun’s damage with a healthy diet.

Despite the arguments among the medical profession, one thing is still certain: we do not need to spend all day roasting on the beach or next to the pool slathered in baby oil to avoid a vitamin D deficiency.

We keep hearing about how we need to spend time in the sun unprotected, but with the summer sun blasting down on us, how do we keep from becoming crispy critters? How much sun is enough?

You don’t need hours of sun–especially in the summer–to get your daily requirement of vitamin D. If you go out in the sun in a bathing suit and your skin turns a light pink, (nowhere close to lobster red) you’ve made about 20,000 IU of vitamin D. That’s 50-100 times the recommended daily amount you need, according to Michael Holick, PhD, MD, a Boston University professor of medicine, physiology and biophysics and director of the Bone Health Care Clinic.

But then comes the other dilemma: if we need to use sunscreen at some point to protect our skin, then what do we use? Trying to read and understand the active ingredients on a label on a bottle of sunscreen can be downright daunting. 

”Octyl-methacinnamate”, “phenylbenzimidazole sulfonic acid”, “octyl-dimethyl-PABA”, and “oxybenzone”, are all standard sunscreen ingredients. Are these ingredients safe to put on your skin, and absorbed by your body?

Numerous studies have raised concerns about these chemicals safety:

• Octyl-methacinnamate has been shown to damage skin cells, and many people are highly sensitive or allergic to this ingredient. 


• Bensopenone-3 (BP3), homosalate (HMS), 4-methyl-benzylidene camphor (4-MBC), octyl-methoxycinnamate (OMC), and octyl-dimethyl-PABA (OD-PABA) were all found to have estrogenic effects in the body, which can lead to certain cancers, including breast cancer.


• Oxybenzone has been shown to decrease sperm count and lengthen the estrous cycle in mice; again a possible carcinogen in humans.

For those sunscreen users with sensitive skin and lingering concerns about sun exposure and sunscreen, the best and most natural sunscreen may be zinc oxide and titanium dioxide. Both block UVA and UVB rays and have raised no health concerns.

While there is still some risk in spending time in the summer sun without sunscreen, the sunscreen itself can pose an even bigger health risk. The chemicals in sunscreen are very harsh and are rapidly absorbed into the bloodstream. [Read Wrinkles and Skin Care]

One of the best ways to prevent sun damage, while absorbing healthy vitamin D, and protect your skin, is with diet. Edible sunblock is your first line of defense against sunburn, cancer, and prematurely aging skin. Yes, you can actually eat your own healthy version of natural sunscreen by following these recommendations:


• Include plenty of omega 3 fatty acid rich foods in a daily diet (or a really good Omega 3 supplement Like Omega Blue). Research studies show that eicosapentaenoic acid (also called EPA), a kind of omega 3 fatty acid, helps prolong the time that it takes skin to get burnt during sun exposure, and also helps reduce the risk of skin cancer. Omega-3 fatty acids are found and best assimilated from animal products such as grass-fed beef, pastured chickens/eggs,  and cold-water fish like salmon, sardines, and mackerel.


• An optimal balance of omega 3s to omega 6s (3:1, or better) is critical for many, many health factors, including heart health and skin health. According to a study published in the American Health Foundation Journal:

”Epidemiological, experimental, and mechanistic data implicate
omega 6 polyunsaturated fatty acids (PUFAs) as stimulators and long-chain
omega 3 PUFAs as inhibitors of development and progression of a range of human cancers, including melanoma [a deadly form of skin cancer]“.


• Eliminate polyunsaturated vegetable oils in favor of butter, ghee, lard, tallow, olive oil and coconut oil. Some of the oils highest in omega 6’s with virtually no omega 3’s are: soybean, sunflower, cottonseed, peanut, and corn oil. To avoid these, eliminate packaged food, fast food, and prepare fresh, whole food from scratch.


• Eat carotenoids. Carotenoids are nutrients that protect plants and animals from excess sunshine. Just like melanin, they are colorful molecules that reflect UV rays. About 700 different types of carotenoids have been identified. Each of the pigments functions as Mother Nature’s sunblock. When humans ingest carotenoids, they are deposited into the skin to prevent sunburn and oxidative stress, which can lead to cancer.

Leading sources of carotenoids are eggs, spiraling, chlorella, dark-green leafy vegetables (kale, collards, and spinach), and yellow-orange fruits and vegetables (apricots, cantaloupe, carrots, sweet potatoes, yams, and squash). The recommended daily intake of carotenoids is 100 to 200 grams per day of these foods.

The most potent carotenoid is a red pigment found in algae, salmon, trout, shrimp, and lobster meat. It is known as astaxanthin. The algae are normally green. But when subjected to sunshine, they produce the red pigment naturally. Once ingested, astaxanthin is 1,000 times more effective at protecting skin from UV damage than other carotenoids.


• Lycopene: the red avenger. Lycopene is found in red fruits such as tomatoes, red bell pepper and watermelon. Unlike many other fruits and vegetables, where the nutritional content is diminished through cooking, processing tomatoes actually increases the amount of bioavailable lycopene. Thus, tomato paste has much more lycopene than fresh tomatoes.

In the study mentioned here, people who consumed tomato paste had 33% more protection against sunburn compared to a control group after 12 weeks. The level of protection was quite significant. The daily amount was 55 grams (or five tablespoons) of tomato paste consumed with olive oil. It also boosted the level of procollagen in the skin, which suggests potential reversal of the skin aging process.


• Green tea is known to contain a category of antioxidants called polyphenols that boost the ability of skin to protect itself from the sun. The polyphenols in green tea have the ability to reduce the damage caused by ultraviolet rays and protect it from photo aging, both when applied externally as a topical cream or a lotion, and when consumed internally as food. If the idea of drinking warm green tea on a hot day is unappetizing, go for a refreshing cup of iced green tea.

[Another excellent choice for a summertime beverage is Young Living's 'red' juice, NingXia Red - an excellent choice for those who do not want caffeine and for those who want to obtain a super high levels of antioxidants, far greater nutritional benefits than Green tea. Mix 1-3 oz. of NingXia Red in a glass of ice water and get the benefits of a nutrient infusion without any junk juices! Through July you can get 2 - 1 liter bottles for free, see how here.]

• Snack on vitamin and flavanol-rich fruit this summer. Summer brings with it a bounty of berries and other fruit such as mangoes, kiwis, peaches and plums that are naturally sweet and juicy. Most fruits are rich in vitamin C, a highly skin-protective and skin-repairing vitamin. While vitamin C is the most commonly occurring antioxidant in skin, it gets depleted rapidly. Known for its role in building collagen, vitamin C prevents wrinkles and photo damage through its anti-inflammatory action.


[Young Living has a chewable C, "Super C" #3251 available here, terrific for when you're not getting enough C, tastes yummy too].

• Another snack that reduces inflammation and sunburn is dark chocolate. Eaten prior to sun exposure or just immediately after sun exposure, test subjects showed significantly less sunburn than the control group who had not eaten chocolate. [Please read labels, there is a lot of chocolate out there that is just not healthy, either due to its processing or other added ingredients.]

Sources: 



Shane Ellison, “Chemist forces children to eat sunscreen”, www.thepeopleschemist.com, 2008


Arathi, ” How to Eat For Internal Sun Protection”, http://www.ehow.com/members/arathi.html



Jennifer Barrett, “On the Bright Side”, Experience Life Magazine, July/August 2009, Lifetime Fitness.