It's the one thing you can't go outdoors without in the summer - and it's not your sunglasses. Sunscreen has become a must for those planning to spend even a short time outside during the all-too short warm season in the GTA. But the creams and lotions you smear on your skin aren't a cure all for everything and some experts fear they can give a false sense of security and lead you to stay out longer than you should.
And while most of us accept the screens as a necessity, fewer question exactly what's in all those protective products. But according to a non-profit group, what you don't know
can hurt you. The
Environmental Working Group tested more than 780 sunscreen products currently on the market, and found many contain potentially harmful chemicals which could be bad for your children. Among them: something called oxybenzone that the group fears could act as a hormone disruptor for your kids.
At least 95 percent of the girls they tested who used sunscreen had the substance in their urine. And that's raising alarm bells for researchers. "These are 6 to 8-year-old girls," points out Mike Layton of Environmental Defence. "These are girls that the hormone balance needs to be just right in young people's development."
And that's not the only concern about what's in all those lotions and sprays. "You're putting it directly onto your skin and then you're going ... swimming in the lake or you're washing it off and it's ... ending up in the water supply," warns Layton.
Parents of young children are shocked to hear about the findings. "I honestly thought that putting sunscreen on him was helping him," confesses Kristen Goudie, the mother of a small child. "So I'm a little bit upset by that."
Just 16 percent of those sunscreens tested actually passed as being safe and effective in rankings made the group. How did the product you use fare? See
the complete list of best and worst here.
Common misleading sunscreen claims
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