Half of new sun care launches fail to combine UVA and UVB screens

In recent years scientific research has highlighted the importance of providing UVA protection as standard in sunscreen products because of the important role it can have in fighting the effect these rays have on skin ageing and cell mutation.

As a result many manufacturers have reacted by incorporating the more traditional UVB screens – which actually help prevent the skin from burning – alongside the UVA screens to create a more comprehensive protection.

However, market research provider Mintel says that according to a study it recently carried out, fewer than half of the more than 750 sunscreen products launched in Europe during 2007 actually contained protection for both types of UV rays.

This kind of formulation dates back to some of the earliest sun care products on the market, which had far lower SPF protection and were solely developed to provide UVB protection.

“For a sunscreen to be as effective as possible, it should really protect against UVA and UVB ray,”​ said Alexandra Richmond, senior beauty analyst at Mintel.

“What many people may not realise is that if they just have UVB protection, they are less likely to burn but they have no protection agains the harmful and ageing effects of UVA rays.”​

Although the importance of UVA protection is hard to dispute in current sun care formulation, a recent study suggests that UVB protection still remains the most important of the two.

Published in the current issue of the journal of the Federation of American Societies for Experimental Biology (FASEB), the study found that points to the fact that both types of radiation illicit DNA damage, however the body finds it harder to repair that caused by UVB.

This explains why UVB is more likely to cause skin cancer than UVA​ said the scientists led by Dr Ahmad Besaratinia at City of Hope National Medical Centre.

"Our study is novel in that it fills the gaps in knowledge of mechanisms involved in sunlight-associated skin cancers, which cover various aspects of ​DNA​ damage and repair and genetic alterations,"​ said Besaratinia.

Likewise further research recently published in Experimental Dermatology and sponsored by the American company AGI Dermatics also highlighted the significant role UVB plays in photoageing, a realm that has hitherto been associated with UVA.

Although the UVB rays do not penetrate the skin so deeply they lead to damage in the deeper layers of the skin.