How Does Sunscreen Work
As soon as the summer weather hits, the warm weather entices you to enjoy outside activities. It’s common for your skin to have increased exposure to the sun’s rays. While natural sunlight boosts your mood and gives your body’s immune system much needed Vitamin D, exposure can also cause the skin to burn rapidly, which contributes to premature aging. If you’ve ever seen a person who has “leathery” skin this is totally due to overexposure to sunlight. Fortunately, the best way to protect yourself from sunburn is by using a good quality sunscreen.
When unprotected skin is exposed to intense sunlight, it will burn after a matter of minutes due to what’s called ultra violet light (UV). There are two main categories of ultra violet light that causes skin damage: UVA and UVB.
UVB is what’s most responsible for sunburn, while UVA is the culprit behind causing wrinkles and sunspots.
The Role of Sunscreen in Protecting Your Skin
Sunscreens contain active ingredients like Zinc Oxide that play a big role in creating a protective filter from the damaging effects of UV rays. It’s important to know that there isn’t such a thing as 100% protection from ultra violet light, but it is possible to filter out most of it.
Sunscreens are given an SPF rating based on how much protection they offer from UV rays. SPF means Sun Protection Factor. Every sunscreen is going to show its SPF number, which ranges from 15 to 40 and above. So, in simple terms, the higher the SPF, the more protection your skin gets from sunburn. These ratings are based on how long it takes for your skin to burn after applying the sunscreen.
For instance, a sunscreen that provides you with an SPF of 40 gives you 40 times the protection from UV light than if the skin is left unprotected. Therefore, the higher numbers effectively filter out about 97-98% of UV light. The American Academy of Dermatology recommends using a sunscreen with an SPF of 30 or higher for the best protection.
Excessive Sun Exposure Causes Skin Damage
When you watch children happily playing outside in the summer sun, it never occurs to you that these children are getting heavy doses of sun rays that could one day lead to wrinkles. However, this is exactly the case. A teenager with smooth skin, who is sunbathing at the local park because they want to get a deep tan to look cool, is one day going to be concerned about dry skin, and those deep creases forming on their forehead and around their eyes.
It doesn’t seem fair, but the fact is that most sun damage that leads to premature aging of the skin happens at a young age. Studies have shown that 90% of the cause of skin damage is due to exposure to UV rays. This means that by the time you start noticing wrinkles appearing, you’re in a position of having to slow down the damage that has already occurred years earlier.
People with fair skin are at the greatest risk of sustaining severe skin damage, because of a lack of melanin in the body. Melanin is a natural substance that protects the skin from sunlight. If you have very fair skin and burn quickly when outside in the sun, you must always take steps to use a sunscreen with an SPF of 30 or higher.
While darker skin tones have more protection from UV rays, the skin still burns after a certain amount of exposure. Everyone, regardless of skin tone, can benefit from using some sort of sunscreen protection.
