Rodney, founding director of Eternal Dermatology + Aesthetics in Maryland, tells Yahoo Life. 'There’s still ongoing research on the long-term effects of these ingredients,' board-certified dermatologist Dr. It's a lot to take in and, if you've made shopping for safe sunscreen a priority, it's understandable that you might feel a little overwhelmed by all this. 'There is recent evidence that it can cause DNA damage and hormone abnormalities in aquatic life.' 'In humans, this has been shown to be safe in concentrations up to 10%,' she continues. Jamie Alan, associate professor of pharmacology and toxicology at Michigan State University, tells Yahoo Life.

Still, 'there is little detail on this so far,' Dr.

“The FDA doesn’t know what their safety is and it’s unconscionable that the FDA would allow something that we don’t know if it’s safe or not.”Ī study published in the journal Chemical Research in Toxicology in March tested 16 octocrylene-based sunscreens, including Coppertone Water Babies spray, Banana Boat SPF 50 lotion and a Neutrogena Beach Defense spray - and all of them tested positive for benzophenone. About 2,400 sunscreens are made with octocrylene and “we don’t know what their safety is,” Downs told Bloomberg. Researchers wrote a letter calling on the FDA to pull all sunscreens that contain the active ingredient octocrylene.

Products made with octocrylene may contain benzophenone, a suspected carcinogen that can interfere with certain hormones and reproductive organs, according the nonprofit Haereticus Environmental Laboratory. Beyond the fact that any amount of benzene in sunscreens is concerning, 14 sunscreen samples actually tested above that 2 ppm threshold, containing between 2.78 and 6.26 ppm of benzene.

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