Alright I have my creepily happy sun pic up again, so that means – you guessed it, more talk about sun screen.
Remember this post from March about how what you don’t know about sun screen might be compromising your safety? Well the FDA has finally made some new rules about sun screens that will be effective next year. You definitely will see some changes when you shop for sunscreen after these go into effect!
What you’ll see…
– Sun screens will be required to list protection against UVB (causes sun burn) and UVA (causes skin cancer) rays. SPF ratings will still be there to rate UVB protection, and UVA protection will be rated 1 to 4 stars.
What you won’t see…
– Sun screens marketed as “waterproof”. There is no such thing as a sun screen that is water proof. They can only claim to be “water resistant” or “sweat resistant”.
– Sun screens marketed as anything higher than “SPF 50+”. There is no evidence of any benefits of SPF higher than 50. So those Neutrogena sunscreens that claim to be SPF 100? Pure marketing BS.
These finalized standards have taken the FDA over 30 years to draft. Why on earth has it taken the FDA so long to put an end to the blatant false advertising on so many sun screen products? In Europe, even higher standards for sun screens have been in place for years already. In fact, according to the Environmental Working Group, about 20% of the products on the U.S. market that do pass muster under the new standards still would not be able to be sold in the E.U.
The EWG has a great site full of information about sun screens, as well as an app to help you research sun screens from your iphone! Now, I know that they also have a database of which cosmetics have cancer-causing ingredients, but I really wouldn’t worry about your makeup possibly causing cancer – the odds of getting skin cancer from not having adequate protection are way higher than the odds of getting it from wearing foundation!
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