Sunlight vs Sunscreen: What’s Really Causing Skin Cancer? - Dr. Barrett Deubert

You know, it's like if you're indoor all week, right, and just grinding in an office forty plus hours a week, and then on Saturday, you go to the lake and you burn, that's a problem, right? That's not good. But that's not how we're meant to be. We are meant to live outside all day, every day and get slow steady exposure through seasons. We weren't meant to be, you know, in a cave and then go get burned.

Welcome back to another episode of the Real Health Podcast. Today's episode, we're talking about the power of light, sunlight that is, and does sunscreen cause cancer? Should I use it? And if I do use it, what are the situations that should justify the use of sunscreen? Which sunscreens do you have to stay away from, 100% avoid, and which ones are ideal?

That's everything we're gonna talk about in today's episode. Welcome to spring. It's beautiful out. We're gonna be outside. Let's talk about how to maximize our health with sunlight.

We've been told to avoid the sun, right? It's like cover up, bundle up, avoid the sun as much as possible because it's gonna cause damaging effects. But what if that advice is actually making us sicker? Right? What if that is is like the food pyramid?

When you looked at it, it was supposed to be the health standard in nutrition. Yet, the food pyramid only caused an increase in chronic disease. Skin cancer rates are rising despite more sunscreen than ever before. Did you ever think about that? It's like, why is cancer rates higher than ever before, yet we're spending more money on testing the cause of cancer?

Why is heart disease rates increasing? And if sunscreen was truly meant to prevent skin cancer, and we're using it more than ever, why are rates only increasing? And so what we're gonna talk about first is the vitamin D deficiency epidemic. We are extremely low as a society in vitamin D. And so is the sun actually dangerous or is the relationship with it broken, right?

That's the conversation we're gonna have today. And it's the relationship just to jump to it. When we look at the biology of sun, what is the sun actually doing? Like why do we need it? Because you need it to survive.

And so I have a few points of reference here. The first thing that the sun does is it helps set your circadian rhythm. The circadian rhythm is your sleep awake cycle. And so that morning sunlight, when you get into the eyes and it gets to the brain called the hypothalamus, it sets your internal clock. Seeing sunlight first thing in the morning is massive at setting the clock for the day.

It helps with sleep quality, your cortisol hormonal rhythm, and overall, it helps with your hormonal balance. When you set up your circadian rhythm healthy, which means see sun in the morning and don't see the sun in the evening, right, so turn off the blue lights in the evening, and make sure you get that first sunlight exposure when you rise in the morning. That's what helps set your biology up. It's what we were designed to wake and work and sleep according to the rhythm of the sun. Number two, what the sun does is actually there's a component of sunlight or light therapy called red and infrared, and red and infrared light is a powerhouse light for the mitochondria.

The mitochondria are your power plants of the cell. They generates energy. So like a plant getting, in essence, sunlight, and that chlorophyll is creating energy for the plant, the same thing's true, our chlorophyll system, our energy system is the mitochondria, And that is activated with red and infrared. It boosts production of energy, cellular repair, anti inflammatory pathways. So that's what the sun is actually doing.

Number three is the sun allows for nitric oxide release. We are absolutely in an epidemic of nitric oxide depletion. Nitric oxide is a big blood vessel dilator. It allows for lower blood pressure, lower heart disease rates, but it can't release unless we get sunlight exposure. The sunlight, when it hits the skin, releases nitric oxide.

If you're having symptoms of heart disease related to hypertension, get out in the sun. And the fourth thing it does is it increases vitamin D production. There's, in essence, what happens is when you consume cholesterol, yes, you need cholesterol to make vitamin D, it's the backbone of vitamin D. When you consume cholesterol, the cholesterol on the skin is then with the sunlight, with UVB rays specifically, UVB turns that cholesterol into vitamin D3. So, this is vital for immune function and regulation, bone health, cancer prevention.

It's a hormone in essence. While vitamin D is actually not a vitamin at all. So, the sun is essential for vitamin D synthesis or production. And the issue that we're seeing is that there is research, and I'm gonna give you a range, and it's in between forty to seventy percent of Americans are deficient in vitamin D. That's substantial.

If you just kinda get close to the middle and just say one out of two, one out of two are in a deficient state, and deficient state isn't even necessarily functionally low. I would say another forty percent are functionally low, but deficiency is extremely low, rock bottom. And when we're deficient to this level of vitamin D, it's linked to autoimmune disease, depression, cardiovascular risk, cancer risk increase, and you cannot get adequate vitamin D from food alone. So you have to get sunlight exposure for vitamin D production to happen. Sunlight is the primary evolutionary source of vitamin D.

The more sunlight, the better your production. And when you look at, if you look at your labs, optimal levels are close to about sixty nanograms per milliliter, yet most patients are around fifteen, twenty, 25. They're definitely sub 30. And so most of people need to be doubling their vitamin D levels. And when you see that deficiency, you're like, Oh, well, I need to supplement vitamin D.

Yes and no. You need to get out in the sun and supplement with vitamin D, and then retest. So when it comes to vitamin D, sunlight is the powerhouse to make it. Getting out in the sun is necessary. And this is something that's interesting, right?

I was just kinda processing this week when I was thinking about the episode. And I was like, well, if sunscreen is not reducing our cancer rates, okay, does it block vitamin D production? So when you put on sunscreen, does it stop your body's ability to make vitamin D and synthesize it? And the answer is yes. Now, not everyone covers their entire body with sunscreen, but if you did, that sunscreen is absolutely blocking UVB.

And UVB is necessary to react with cholesterol and make vitamin D. So chronic deficiency is absolutely linked to sunscreen usage. And the problem with sun, the sun in sunscreen is we shouldn't fear the sun. The sun is healing for the body. So it's not like the sunlight is bad, it's how we use it.

It's like if you're indoor all week, right, and just grinding in an office forty plus hours a week, and then on Saturday, you go to the lake and you burn, that's a problem, right? That's not good. But that's not how we're meant to be. We are meant to live outside all day, every day and get slow steady exposure through seasons. We weren't meant to be, you know, in a cave and then go get burned.

And that's kind of what we get in today's society. So there is an ideal gradual exposure that isn't gonna link itself to sun damage, which is a problem, and it's gonna be essential biology of slow sun exposure. Your body is designed to adapt to the sun, but only if you expose it on a regular basis. And when we look at sunscreen, if it's a high SPF, it's gonna block UVB production. And when we look at heavy use, there is issues even beyond lack of vitamin D production.

Like when you look at oxybenzone is a common ingredient used in sunscreen. These benzones, this benzone ring, this chemical ring is very toxic to the body. It's actually carcinogenic, which is linked to cancer in the body. So when we put this oxybenzone type active ingredient on our body, it's not benefiting us. It's increasing our cancer risks and it's blocking vitamin D production.

And so not only is it increasing cancer risk, but there's research that shows sunscreen is a hormone disruptor, an endocrine disruptor. It's linked to cross reacting and creating inflammation within your cells, cellular stress, hormone imbalances, right? There's a lot of problems that can happen from chronic, I'm gonna say bad sunscreen, right? So what we wanna use instead, because there is a time at which where if you're gonna be out in the sun for a very extended period of time and you're not, you haven't conditioned through melanin production, you haven't conditioned your skin, then you're gonna need sunscreen or you're gonna need body coverage. So what are some alternatives?

And there's two main ones. It's called zinc oxide or titanium oxide. And really the way they work is the molecule of zinc and titanium oxide are so large, they don't actually get absorbed into the skin at all. They stay on the surface of the skin. Well, how do you know that?

Well, you're white as a ghost. It's kind of the negative, right? You put on this natural sunscreen, and you're like, I can't rub it in. It's not being absorbed. You wanna know why?

Well, it's not going to get absorbed. The zinc oxide and titanium oxide, it does not get absorbed into the skin. So it's gonna, you're just gonna be white, all right? That's the problem with it. That's the downside.

And I get it. You're like, oh, that's terrible. But it does, it is the safer, healthier option. And hey, if you're already pale as a ghost, right, because you've been inside, well, who cares? You're just a little bit whiter.

And so I would suggest if you were looking at healthy alternatives to sunscreen, make sure you look for a zinc or titanium oxide. As this sits on the skin, it doesn't get absorbed systemically, it still blocks your UV rays and obviously has a lower toxicity profile. So getting sunlight is essential to our biology. It's essential to our circadian health, vitamin D production. That red infrared from the sun is essential for mitochondrial production.

You gotta get it, right? So what do we start with? So, my recommendation based on your skin type is anywhere between ten to thirty minutes a day. So, if you can get 10 at the minimum, up to thirty minutes of sunlight a day over as much of the body as you can, right? So, if you're in the backyard, take the shirt off, get in a bathing suit, whatever, just try to get as much body exposure as you can, Prioritizing the morning light, which helps with circadian rhythm, and then midday light is great for vitamin D production.

Build up slowly, okay? So, stop exposure before the skin turns pink. When the skin starts to turn pink, you're overexposed. You got to make sure you get out of the situation, okay? But if you slowly titrate your time up and build up that melanin production, you will develop some resistance to obviously sun burning.

So, build your tolerance gradually over time and now's a great time since the sun isn't too strong or near to the Knoxville, East Tennessee area. Sunscreen, when use do it? Well, obviously when there's long exposure and high UV index. And make sure you choose a mineral based zinc oxide. And then support the skin internally, right?

The skin needs, it needs properties to function. It's an organ. It needs nutrients. What nutrients does the skin need to avoid burning? Omega-three fatty acids is probably at the top of the list.

Okay, so fish oil. Number two, vitamin C and vitamin E antioxidants are fantastic. Make sure you're hydrated well. It is essential for healthy skin and consider that again, if you are in long sun exposure environments or high UV index environments, so just go ahead and use UV protective clothing. I would say that's a great option for a lot of people.

The sun isn't the enemy, right? It's the one of the most powerful healing tools that we have in our cabinet, quote unquote. But the key is respecting it, not avoiding it, and don't lather yourself with chemicals that's causing cancer. Hey, thanks for listening to another episode of the Real Health Podcast.