Summer is coming up and most of us will welcome lots more time in the sun. As someone who long ago grew skeptical of claims about the miracles in a tube of this chemical or that, I put away the brand new super awesome 100 plus spf a couple years ago and decided to go old school when comes to avoiding sunburns and skin cancer. Some common sense and these 4 rules of thumb have worked well for me.
1) Kids have it worse. Whatever steps I take for myself, I take double care for kids under 12. They burn worse and the sunburns you get as a child are the ones that really do lead to skin cancer trouble later in life. More than anything else, this is why I switched away from sunscreen and started using sun kids protective clothing and kids UPF 50+ swimwear.
2) If you can see through it, it isn’t working. If you can see light through a fabric but not anything else, the Ultraviolet Protection Factor, or UPF, is about 15 to 30. If there is no light at all coming through, that is UPF 50+ clothing. So, a white t-shirt. especially a wet one, is almost useless and denim is overkill on a hot day. Tightly woven fabrics that still breathe and stay cool are best. Dark colors are better than light ones, and a rash guard or swim shirt is really the only thing that doesn’t fail in the surf.
3) I don’t always wear sunscreen, but when I do, it is has to have zinc oxide or titanium oxide as the main ingredient. The rest is just chemical salad mumbo jumbo and marketing copy. Those two ingredients are the only things that block UV radiation just like clothing.
4) Any place where there are reflective surfaces like beach sand, sea foam, snow, fog has a LOT more sun coming at you. And it comes from weird angles. There is a reason folks go to the beach to get an all over tan - FAST.
