In short:
The Therapeutic Goods Administration (TGA) says 21 sunscreens that share the same base formulation have been recalled, paused or are under its review.
The TGA says it has “significant concerns” about the reliability of SPF testing undertaken by Princeton Consumer Research (PCR), an overseas laboratory many sunscreen brands used to support their SPF claims.
The agency says it has written to PCR about its concerns, but has not received a response.
If your favourite brand comes in at 20+ instead of 50+, it’s fine to keep using it. I won’t say this is a beat-up, but they’re making out like you should throw your sunscreen out, when 20 odd years ago all sunscreens were 24+ and that was normal. Just be sure to re-apply it every two hours if you are in the sun a long time.
For most of the affected brands, this is more a potential issue with false advertising than public safety. Also noteworthy that most of the brands produced results from independent testing when approached for comment. The Cancer Council said they’re going to submit their affected products for another round of tests with another lab. So the brands are taking this seriously and most of them appear to be acting in good faith.
Most of Choice’s tests were performed on ten volunteers in line with Australian and international standards. Three tests were performed on five volunteers.
This is important to remember. We aren’t talking big sample sizes, here. It’s really important to shine a light on Sunscreens and be certain they are up to the task. But at the same time, don’t overreact.
Ultra Violette’s Lean Screen SPF50+ Mattifying Zinc Sunscreen, which costs $52 for 75 millilitres, and returned an SPF rating of four.
Ok, so this one is difficult to defend - I wouldn’t use it. 😂
Maybe I’m blind but I could not see a link in the article to list of the sunscreens so here it is:
Sunscreens using the same base formulation as Ultra Violette Lean Screen SPF 50+ sunscreen
All of those brands bleating about the Choice testing having ‘bad testing’ are now being found out.
It took the TGA way too long to take this seriously, but at least something seems to be happening now.
I saw a youtube video once with a person who had used Asian sunscreens wondering what was going on with the Australian ones which felt a lot worse. She put a variety on her back in squares and went in the sun. Not my usual watch but reasonably decent citizen science stuff. I don’t take health advice from youtubers but clearly basic sunscreen testing has trivial testing requirements that don’t require a lot of expensive lab equipment. That we took assurances from for profit companies that paid for profit foreign testing laboratories at their word instead of do the most basic testing to verify them is kind of crazy. I think this happens too often in this country.
Edit: Found the video Is Australian Sunscreen ACTUALLY stronger than Asian Sunscreen? - I wouldn’t take it as purchase advice. The presenter would be the first to acknowledge faults in her testing I think, But its interesting to see someone go through what is essentially the scientific process and compare it to the years authorities have just accepted the cosmetic industries numbers without verification. Science without replication is worthless.
Obviously you need to be careful going down this line of reasoning. People who become experts reading their conspiratorial social media feed and listening to their alternative health practitioner aren’t in a position to be influencing complicated public health matters. But sunscreen you can ab test on yourself and while you won’t be able to tell how much of the harmful spectrum a particular product blocks, which is still important, you can definitely throw out the one that gets you sunburnt much faster. It seems odd in a country that used to pride itself on innovation that nobody was doing this.
