Should You Use Sunscreen?

Posted by Rafe Furst in Cancer, Causality, Epidemiology, Health, Interventions, Invisible Etiology, Memes, Science, Science 2.0 on August 25th, 2009 | View Comments
This is a very complex topic, as the following talk suggests: [youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eeXtGHSt-5o&feature=related [/youtube] The main takeaways from this that I got are:
  1. Cancers for which sunlight deficit is a risk factor are orders of magnitude more prevalent than the few for which overexposure is a risk factor.
  2. People who are using sunscreen regularly are precisely the ones who shouldn't be.
  3. We should be very careful and sparing about recommending sunscreen usage or sun avoidance, and always temper such advice with the tradeoffs of not getting enough sunlight.
As someone who wonders on a regular basis whether the public has the right information to make informed decisions about health-related tradeoffs, I am curious... does the above strike you as surprising?  What do you currently do regarding sun exposure, and are you likely to change anything based on the above?  What do you think the overall message that reaches the masses is regarding sun exposure?

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  • Dorian
    Moderation seems to be the logical way to go.
  • Tiltmom
    I try to see to it that the kids and I get 30 minutes of unprotected exposure every day. The sunscreen stays on for the remainder of the day.

    We also supplement with Vitamin D, with the dosage depending upon how much sunlight we expect to get that day. (Higher doses in winter and on rainy days.)
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