[Angela] (0:00 - 0:05)
If we're wearing sunscreen, can we still synthesise vitamin D?

[Liz Earle] (0:06 - 3:59)
There's a long answer to that question. The short answer is no. The long answer is much more nuanced.

It depends. If you are wearing your sunscreen properly, which very few of us do, bear in mind that it needs to be applied very thickly and it needs to be applied absolutely to totally cover the skin. Now, most of us don't do that.

Most of us, if we're using it, we'll put it on a thin layer, we'll miss bits. So when people say, yes, you get vitamin D from the sun when you're using sunscreen, yeah, because you're not using your sunscreen properly. You're actually allowing some of that UVB to come through the skin.

But when you look at the clinical tests in the labs where they're applying it properly, they're no, because it's designed to block it. And if it's not blocking it, then it's not working. So, you know, for me, and I talk a lot in the book about safe sun exposure.

You know, I have a beauty background. I am very interested and highly invested as a woman with fair skin, ageing, not to age and damage my skin. Okay.

That is absolutely priority. But I think in the whole public health messaging, we've taken it too far and too extreme, and we've lost sight of actually the goodness of sunshine and daylight. And we've become too frightened of it.

And we've become the messaging is far too broad. So for example, I talk about the public health campaign on the London Underground, and there's a clinical dermatologist actually, who I spoke to at length for the book. And she writes papers on skin cancer.

She's a serious expert, very highly published. And she really took issue with this campaign because it was run on London Underground in the winter. And it was talking about the importance of wearing SPF 50.

And she was saying, it's ridiculous. It is absolutely ridiculous, because people leave home before the sun comes up, they're travelling underground, because that's where these posters are. They're then walking into their office, they're indoors, because it's cold, and they're going to stay indoors for most of the day.

And then they walk back to the tube, and they go home again. And it's dark, because obviously, in the wintertime, it's dark by about four o'clock. Tell me why you'd need to block your with a sunscreen, there is no sun.

So I think we need to be much cleverer about where we use sunscreen, it's judicious use of it. Obviously, if you're fair skinned, and you're out in the middle of the day, with strong sun exposure, you do not want to burn your skin. And you need to protect it.

For me personally, I prefer to cover my skin. I prefer to cover it with clothing, with a hat, sit in the shade or whatever. But that's my personal choice.

Other people might want to use a sunscreen. I think we also have to understand that there are hidden consequences that are only just being discovered now about some of the synthetic sunscreens. For example, there's this connection between the skin's microbiome and our immune cell modulating, they talk to each other that the skin cell, the skin's microbiome has a direct relationship of communication with the rest of the body, the skin is actually an organ of light reception.

This is what we're just beginning to understand that the skin has light receptors on it for reasons they're signalling, it's not just blocking and keeping our insides intact, the skin is actually doing something active in the light. And if we disrupt those signals, there is potential to disrupt how our immune system might function. And this is something that the scientists are looking at.

There's also the issue of skin sensitivity and the dermatologists seeing increasing numbers of rosacea, psoriasis, inflammatory skin conditions, perioral dermatitis, for example, because of overloading the skin with unnecessary ingredients. So I'm not anti-SPF at all. I'm just saying be careful and mindful of the type that you use and when you use it.

[Angela] (3:59 - 4:24)
Hmm. Yeah, for sure. And also I suppose like some of them contain toxins, right?

And things that you don't want absorbed into your skin as well. You talk about preparing the skin, which is kind of a new area as well of science in terms of going out in the morning light, which I guess we would have done ancestrally, right? We would have been awake around sunrise.

What can we do to kind of prepare our skin, especially now we're sort of recording this in May in anticipation of summer?

[Liz Earle] (4:25 - 6:38)
Well, the people who work with quantum biology and circadian biology and who are very much in favour of getting a lot of sunlight also do not want anybody to be damaging their skin. So it's about adapting the skin. And the worst thing that we can do is stay indoors all year and then rush out for our two week summer beach holiday and fry ourselves on the beach.

We wonder why we go red and we burn. That's because our skin has not got used to the sunlight. We haven't adapted to it.

So this is a good time of year if you want to get some gentle adaptation by going out early in the day when the UV is low and the UV index generally is lower at this time of year and just getting five, 10 minutes, just building up gradually that sun exposure. And then your skin does become acclimatised. It does thicken slightly, which is good.

That's what you want it to do. That's what things like retinols do, makes the skin stronger. It's producing more collagen.

And interestingly, some of those early morning light signals are also talking to fibroblasts in the skin. Fibroblasts are the cells that are making collagen and elastin. So I don't know if you take collagen supplements.

I do. But actually by going out in early morning light, I'm telling my body to make more collagen. So it's preparing the skin.

And you're right. You know, when we look historically, we were getting up with the dawn and we were going out and working in the fields or hunting and gathering or whatever. And so our skin was being primed for what we knew would come later in the day, which is stronger sunlight.

So it stands to reason that the skin starts to make those anti-inflammatory protective chemicals. It starts to produce nitric oxide. It starts to create the fibroblast setting up for more collagen and elastin because we know that we're going to need it later on in the day.

Now, if we miss that early signalling and we go out straight later in the day, our skin has not been prepared for that, is not ready to receive the stronger wavelengths of light. And actually, when you look at things like pigmentation, that really comes from the disruption of melanin forming into clumps and clusters because the skin hasn't adapted properly. So if you can adapt your skin properly, then you're going to see far less sign of damage.

[Angela] (6:38 - 7:11)
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So just by kind of timing this effectively, we can enhance, as you say, things like collagen and elastin production. We can protect our skin effectively. We can optimise for vitamin D.

We can optimise our sleep and wake cycle. It's just amazing the effects on light.

[Liz Earle] (7:11 - 8:32)
Isn't it? I mean, who knew this? I mean, this is going to become commonplace.

This book, I have to say, it may seem a bit out there right now, but I think a lot of things do seem weird and extraordinary until they become mainstream. And then it's just like, oh yeah, no, we know. Of course we need some sunlight.

Of course we know. We mustn't go and smother ourselves in sun cream first thing in the morning before we've actually had the chance to get some of the goodness. It is going to become just a commonplace everyday acceptance.

And again, quoting Richard Weller, this professor, he says that he thinks that we will look back at this time and our lack of sun exposure as being as damaging to our health as smoking. I mean, that is a pretty bold statement for a clinician, for a medical clinician to say. So, and again, it's about balance, isn't it?

And I think it's a very nuanced discussion and I'm really keen for people to read about this and understand it. And there's huge sections actually in the book about this because I knew that it would be such a hot topic. And I thought, I'm not just going to glance over this because it's important to fully understand it.

And the book is fully referenced. The back section is packed with clinical studies and references and quoting medics who support this because I really want it to be taken seriously because it's so valuable. It's free and it's valuable.

Many people assume they still get Vitamin D while wearing sunscreen. However, Liz points out that this only happens because most people apply it too thinly or miss spots.

Applying high SPF when it is completely unnecessary, like on a dark winter morning during an underground commute, is a sign that public health messaging has become too broad.

Our skin isn't just a physical barrier; it actively receives light and communicates with the body's immune system.

Exposing your skin to gentle, early-morning sunlight (when the UV index is low) acclimatizes it.

Medical professionals and researchers are beginning to speak out against extreme sun avoidance.