Posted by SanjayMehta 2 days ago
I was following the protocol from this paper, which started people at 2 mins and used low wattage UVB-heavy bulbs.
Sunbeds with UVB radiation can produce physiological levels of serum 25-Hydroxyvitamin D in healthy volunteers
https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC5821157/
Unfortunately the Science Advances paper being discussed is epidemiological and doesn't distinguish between the type of bulb, length of time, and other parameters used while tanning. However it is safe to say that the average tanner cares more about getting dark than anything else.
I think there would actually be a market for vitamin D centered "healthy tanning" where only low wattage, high-UVB bulbs are used particularly in cloudy areas or where the winter is long. I'm that guessing the operating costs for that kind of business would be cheaper than your average tanning salon, too.
I've seen this "optimising for some perceived negative effects" thing with toothbrushes/toothpaste, where "whitening" and stiff bristles actually just means removing more (irreplaceable) enamel from your teeth.
Even in healthy people, oral vitamin D is not always sufficient (there was a study done in Japan where sunlight is low but Vitamin D from fish is high - can't find it right now) and sunlight exposure might have other benefits than vitamin D anyway
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0022202X2...
There is ample results on better health correlated with higher levels of Vitamin D, but the reverse is far more teneous: shoving in Vitamin D isn't guaranteed to be properly absorbed, and even when it is we don't see conparable results to people producing the Vitamin D themselves.
An example: https://academic.oup.com/jbmr/article/38/10/1391/7610360
Do you have research showing sunlight Vitamin D has benefit for someone who is not deficient?
Even just for vitamins, many precursor are found related to light: https://arc.aiaa.org/doi/10.2514/6.2023-4698
> Even in the small subgroup of subjects with a poorer vitamin D status (serum 25OHD < 20 ng/mL), no effect on fracture risk was observed (hazard ratio [HR] = 1.07; 95% confidence interval [CI] 0.91–1.25).
> A large RCT in Mongolian children with severe vitamin D deficiency did not find a beneficial effect of vitamin D supplementation on the subsequent risk of subclinical or clinical tuberculosis.
Most people need sun!
I think that the correct approach would be start at 10x vitamin D with baseline bloodwork and adjust dosage from there.
But yeah I’m in the camp of “sun is good for you, in most cases.” I would be very unsurprised to find that there are precursor hormones released beyond vitamin D that impact efficacy. We don’t really understand the endocrine system very well.
I think that because we can see and understand the dermatological effects we overly weight them. Anecdotally older people I know who have not avoided the sun seem much better off mentally and physically, but I think because there isn’t a measurable reason we’re aware of, we completely discount any benefit.
> Very few (~10%) of people can absorb dietary vitamin D.
https://img.ifunny.co/images/5ab4dda29b9dd88acc439076537e0c4...
> 2 min a month
I tried to find an LED strip equivalent but couldn't not - there are strips that produce a lower wavelength than UV-A but from what I remember it was too low of a nm for good vitamin D.
Could be an interesting product however ! I wanted to hand two strips in my shower and turn them on for a few minutes while I washed up during the winter.
Unfortunately even the tanning beds you were using still produce a lot of UV-A which will age your skin. And funnily enough UV-B also produces a much longer lasting tan (though slower) which would mean less return trips for people who are just looking for aesthetics
https://www.dermahealer.com/products/dermahealer-uvb-light-t...
https://heymedsupply.com/kernel-corded-handheld-311nm-narrow...
I might use one of those for most days and a lizard UV lamp one day a week too (1 minute)
But if you find a more affordable to the Sperti please let me know
After all, exercise is the undisputed God tier all-time winning champion of "Studies show that ______ is good for xyz."
While I believe there are many benefits of being outside and exercising, there does appear to be specific benefits to sun-like UV exposure.
- running around outside, because physical activity if healthy
- spending an afternoon in the company of good friends or family
- gardening, which can produce veggies that are pesticide free
Not everything is a biochemical direct benefit of the sun’s rays. Some of the positive effects are a few steps removed.
The current argument I've read for why fair-skinned people even evolved near the North Sea and not anywhere else near the arctic is exactly that the Gulf Stream allowed a cereals-based diet rather than a meat based diet, which led to vitamin D deficiencies which caused problems in pregnancy, leading to people with fairer skin being the most likely to avoid those problems.
You definitely don't need to get your vitamin D from the sun.
Getting sufficient vitamin D takes 6x longer sun exposure for black people than for white people. [2] In northern latitudes that's pretty difficult.
1: https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC7913332/
2: https://news.feinberg.northwestern.edu/2011/09/20/vitamin-d/
My favorite one that I read about is mushrooms. If you grow them in the sun, some species allegedly acquire vitamin D. I am not sure how much nor if this is truly effective, but it gives me a good excuse to grow various mushrooms next spring.
So they put the kids on trains and took them off to the seaside.
But then...
The railway also allowed milk to be brought into the cities. So they added vitamin D to milk. That was how the rickets was solved. In time milk became free at school, usually it was warm by morning break, which was when it would get consumed, from mini-milk bottles, that would get reused.
I am only piecing together this history, no definitive source, unless you include my elderly neighbour. However, food history is fascinating, once you get away from celebrated brands to the unsung heroes of the vegetable aisle.
What I can't work out is why the children were so vulnerable to rickets when the adults weren't. Workers weren't being sent out to the countryside or beach to get some sun, just the kids. Rickets doesn't affect adults with grown bones, in theory, the adults should have had really painful joints and osteoporosis, but maybe this was not understood at the time.
In time the clean air zones were setup and the smog was banished to a certain extent, by which time it became uncommon to fortify milk with vitamin D. Finally we had Margaret Thatcher, famously the 'milk snatcher', for stopping free school milk.
In the UK we do get vitamin D randomly added to processed foods (what else?) and this is a scattergun approach to fortifying the population. If you don't eat processed foods then you are not going to get any of that processed food fortification goodness.
Then there are the animal corpse sources, as in oily fish and whatnot. If you eat any diet except for whole-food-plant-based vegan, then you are going to get vitamin D either through dead animal or fortification. Vegetarians just have to eat maaassivve blocks of cheese, which they will, with a few eggs and some breakfast cereal to get their vitamin D needs roughly covered. Junk-food vegans should get some vitamin D goodness from fortifications too, particularly if they consume things like 'oat milk' (as if oats have mammary glands). Pure junk food, a.k.a. 'Standard American Diet', should also be pretty good for vitamin D.
So this only really leaves the whole-food, plant-based, everything-cooked-from-scratch vegan diet as lacking, at least as far as the winter months is concerned. Was this a problem historically? I don't think so. Since people used to work the fields, they had plenty of vitamin D to carry over for winter.
Before we had 'modern day racism' in the UK, we had a situation where the aristocracy had white skin and everyone else had leathery brown skin, from working outside. White skin was proof that you didn't have to work the fields and therefore, you were higher status. Racism pre-dated racism, if you get my drift, it was mere class-based xenophobia back then. To be 'truly white' you had to have no tan.
Since meat was hard to come by, peasants were 95% vegan by default, yet working the fields, so vitamin D deficiency was not a problem, for the 1% aristocracy (since they had their oily fish, red meat and dairy) or for the 99% that had to spend lots of time outdoors.
I am not sure where you are coming from regarding the Gulf Stream and cereals. The Fertile Crescent was where farming began for Europe, with wheat not actually growing in the UK and other grains (barley) being the chosen grain. It was only with the Norman Conquest that wheat made it to the UK.
When the Romans made it to the UK they were perplexed at what they found. There were two tribes, the nomadic cattle types and the hill fort living grain growers that were not nomadic. The hill forts got in the way of the migration routes between pastures. The Romans were disgusted by the milk drinking since nobody would do that in Rome, where everyone was lactose intolerant, unlike the Celts.
Presumably, children need regular and consistent amounts due to bone growth. Once past puberty, less mineralization of calcium and phosphate happens, which is one of the processes in the body that requires vitamin D.
That and (later) refrigeration allowed dairy products to be transported to the cities, which helped with calcium intake, as well as vitamin D.
https://www.artofmanliness.com/health-fitness/health/podcast...
This might just mean that bodies that are healthier in many other aspects are also better at managing their vitamin D stores which isn't all that surprising.
There are no devices that can produce a full-spectrum light like the one you get from the sun. So my suggestion would be to go outside and breathe instead of sitting in a box.
I'll never understand some people's fetishization with getting darker via tanning though. Theres nothing wrong with light skin, its only a few western countries that seem to have a weird fetishization with cooking your skin longterm to get darker short term. Meanwhile most other countries and peoples are willing to damage their skin in whole other ways trying to get the opposite.
"wealthy people can stay inside while poor people work in the sun" vs. "wealthy people can vacation in sunny countries while poor people stay home in the cold"
It's not that it is a sign of wealth due to leisure. People who work outdoors are tanned too. It's the warmness. The glowing. The gradients. Something impressed upon me at a young age that this is the standard of beauty.
When I'm in Asia and I see people carrying umbrellas and doing skincare, their skin looks clinical and less appealing to me than those who aren't doing it. I logically know the anti-sun regime is healthier for their skin, but my primate brain tells me it's unattractive.
It's unfortunate that increasing melanin production from the sun causes DNA damage. Because it looks so good to me.
There are a variety of drugs that induce pigmentation or melanocyte production, but none are FDA approved. Most of them can lead to cancer, either by uncontrolled cell proliferation, impact on unrelated cell populations, or disrupting normal hormonal signalling.
Melanotan-II was popular some years back, but there are half a dozen others that use a variety of different mechanisms. None of them are approved.
It's unfortunate that we haven't developed something better than exposing ourselves to DNA damage, but it's probably not the biggest priority.
Like sometimes I watch American news and the fake tans are just yucky and kind of gross to me.
Same with western women I see in Asia occasionally, age in 20s but looks easily 30+ while it's the opposite with many Asians. Eastern Europeans tend to avoid the sun more.
It's very much the case that in the Philippines, lighter skin is viewed as upper class haciendero/mestizo culture (not having to work outdoors, not being a nanny, maid, or "helper"). It's the same in many other Asian cultures. Women who live in Asian countries with a high concentration of plastic surgery "procedures" and treatments (like South Korea, for instance) are often the standards of beauty for other Asian countries even though such procedures/whitening and eye/nose surgeries are out of reach.
https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC5664932/#:~:text=9....
As an aside, the chemistry behind UV damage is interesting. You can think of DNA as a sequence of four letters: C, G, A, and T. If there are two neighboring T's, UV can move a bond, linking the two T's together (i.e. thymine dimerization). If you're in the sun, each skin cell gets 50-100 of these pairs created per second. Enzymes usually fix these errors, but sometimes the errors will cause problems during DNA replication and you can end up with mutations. Enough of the wrong mutations can cause skin cancer. So wear sunscreen!
When I was younger I used to intentionally tan for short durations, but now I realize that’s harmful so I just embrace the cave gollum look
But I think on some level we naturally associate severe paleness with being sick or non-social.
I say this as the original commenter
To me personally, I like naturally tan skin (like Asian natural skin) > natural white skin > artificial tanned skin > heavy tanning. Tanned white people just do not look good to me.
If you asked someone else where I live now, I bet answer would be different
To me, something like RFK Junior skin looks disgusting. I always wince when I see a picture of him, like you could make that into leather bag.
Vitamin D deficiency is very common in Canada particularly during winter. The government recommends that everyone intentionally seek out vitamin D rich foods, or to take a supplement.
They almost always just stick to tones within the realm of pantone's skin guide, treating it more like a skin bible instead.
Haus labs and their triclone in 000 is one of the few foundations I've ever had match.
Melanotan is dangerous, sadly.
Tanning causes melanocyte production in your epidermis. Melanotan causes it throughout your body in an uncontrolled manner. In a wide variety of unrelated tissues.
It can lead to uncontrolled melanocyte production that doesn't shut off - cancer. Aggressive melanomas.
It disrupts normal hormone signalling which may downstream cause a variety of deleterious health effects and disease states.
There are also crazy reports of kidney failure, which may or may not be caused by the drug.
https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC7148395/
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/23121206/
https://www.actasdermo.org/en-eruptive-dysplastic-nevi-follo...
Clinuvel Pharmaceuticals intended to offer it as a cosmetic, but abandoned this pursuit in the 2000s due to regulatory restrictions and concerns about the promotion of suntanning. Unlicensed Melanotan II is found on the internet, although health agencies advise against its use due to lack of testing and regulatory approval.
> ...
> Meanwhile most other countries and peoples are willing to damage their skin in whole other ways trying to get the opposite.
The grass has more melanin on the other side.
The grass on the other side has a different amount of melanin be harder-to-achieve and thus more desirable because it previously signaled belonging to the higher socio-economical strata.
It becomes unmissable once someone is in their 30s: Some still have youthful skin, while others are wrinkly, splotched, and saggy.
Blond hair with a tan or black hair with white skin are more contrasting so look more striking.
While some darker skin people want to have lighter skin.
Maybe at some deeper level it’s something about being human. We always want something the other person has
This. Same with curly vs straight hair.
I estimated that 1 minute of artificial tanning is comparable to the 10-15 minutes of sun a day that is recommended. But has the benefit of the whole body's largest organ kicking in for the health benefits. So I tan at home for 1 minute a couple times a week. You can't do this economically with a salon.
I don't really get tan, just a little more color. But when I do get any lengthy sun time due to outdoor activities, I tan quickly instead of burn.
Unless of course our calculations are a bit off, then we accidentally created a bed version of the wrong chalice from raiders of the lost ark, but I think it's fine.
UV comes in an huge variety of strengths outdoors.
There are no calculations to be a "bit off". It's just strong UV. You're making it sound a lot more complicated than it is.
Strong reaction? I don’t know anyone who would believe that.
I don’t think we need to replicate everything about nature to incorporate what we know about nature, ourselves, and the practical details of our lives.
I have bright LEDs around my ceilings, hidden by cove molding, turning the whole ceiling into soft but bright reflected daylight.
It doesn’t need to replicate a real summer day outside to improve my mood and avoid depression in winter. Much better than ordinary indoor lighting.
Most people take some kind of supplement or medication that doesn’t replicate pre-technological natural conditions but provide benefits.
Improving our respective conditions, in the artificial world we live in, can involve quirky adaptations for each of us.
I also walk a lot when I can and weather allows. I started walking with a weighted vest occasionally and it was like my body went into some kind of good shock. I was surprised how little soreness or fatigue I felt even the first time, after a two hour walk wearing 20 lbs. And the physical energy boost was dramatic. I switched to 40 lbs the second time and since.
Do that daily for about four weeks, come rain or shine, whilst enjoying your summer vacation.
Of course that probably doesn't work for every country, but here in Finland it's normal enough. Too bad I'm a pale-skinned redhead, covered in freckles, and I get burned if I'm not too careful.
Why? This is not how we naturally insolate.
I’m not saying you’re wrong. Just that the status quo is different parts of your body getting sun each day. You’re not replicating that, which places the burden of evidence on you.
There isn’t any burden for me to carry here.
Nor am I concerned by your apostate heretical state of disbelief. The persecution only confirms the holiness of my cause.
Disclaimer: My opinions are simply my own, and do not, in any way, reflect the views of my past or future selves, beyond a five minute interval.
After all, supplements are also artificial compounds
That doesn't seem right. If you only tan in a strong tanning bed for 10 min (or 15 min in a weaker one), it's equivalent to only about an hour in the real sun around noon. I.e. if you've only been going to a tanning bed, you'll start to burn outdoors shortly after that. (And I'm talking about high-UVB bulbs that develop the long-lasting tan that protects against sunburn, just like the sun itself generates.)
So the difference factor is more like 4-6x, not 10-15x. Honestly, 15x would be insane. Tanning beds aren't as strong as some fearmongerers suggest. And that's assuming full-body exposure.
When you say you artificially tan at home for 1 minute, how? Did you buy your own entire tanning bed? Because if you use the small portable devices (like a Sperti), they're providing only a tiny fraction of what a tanning bed provides, since they're so small.
I think your calculations are good, that I am operating with a significant time safety margin.
I balanced going (1) “short” on time, (2) “long” on body coverage, and (3) with consistent exposure schedule, for best steady-state body adaptation (I.e. for both high repair and positive health responses). For plausibly higher safety plus higher benefit on all three counts.
Lucky you! So convenient. Yeah, then there's probably a good chance that's developing the vitamin D you need, although bulbs do take around 60 seconds to warm up to full brightness, but I'm just basing that off visual brightness and assuming that UV warm-up time is the same. I'm sure getting your vitamin D levels tested will definitely tell you if you're getting enough or not. If not, well you can always do 2 min, but blood tests give you the definitive answer there.
[1]: https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0022202X2...
In reverse, people thought (and too many still "know") that MSG and pasteurization is bad.
Don't use the word know, when in fact you mean "assume".
It is not "dangerous", and I think that is the problem with the messaging, but it does increase my anxiety, insomnia and fibromyalgia symptoms. And I also thing for most people it is fine, but it certainly does not work with my family's genetics. My mother had the same issue.
Many things in food now replace MSG. Any time you see a protein isolate, what they are isolating is the glutamate. Malted Barley Flour also contains high levels of glutamate and purines (like inosine) that work synergisticly with it to enhance flavor.
Glutamate is an excitatory neurotransmitter, and it makes your taste buds more "excited". My mouth tastes like metal whenever I have foods with glutamate. It is not pleasant for me at all.
https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC9883458/
https://www.eurofins.com/media-centre/newsletters/food-newsl...
In any case, everyone is different and catchall health advice lacks nuance. I have to very consciously consume more and more salt because I habitually cut it out to the point that I now suffer from hyponatremia especially as I exercise and sweat bucket loads.
I'm on blood pressure medication, and haven't received any advice about sodium intake.
As with most food stuffs if not consumed in moderation it can become a problem.
What's wild to me is the economics. Tanning salons charge $30-50/month to give you skin cancer. Meanwhile vitamin D supplements cost $10/year and achieve the same health benefit people claim to seek from tanning.
The only rational argument I've heard for controlled UV exposure is building a base tan before vacation to prevent burning. But even then, 1-2 minutes in a low-wattage bed would suffice - not the 20+ minute sessions people actually do.
Although I think the more interesting question is whether sunbed use increases or decreases overall mortality. The only study I can find is Lindqvist's:
https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/pdf/10.1111/joim.12251?g...
Overall, sunbed use reduced the all-cause mortality by a ratio of 0.77 or 0.87 depending on the model used. It increased the risk of developing MM, and the risk of dying from MM, although all-cause mortality was not increased even in patients diagnosed with MM. (This seems to be because there is a very low overall risk of MM mortality, but UV light exposure seems to provide a greater overall health benefit than the small risk of increased MM risk).