Like many Australians, Rach grew up terrified of the sun in the country with the highest rates of skin cancer in the world. Her childhood was characterized by the infamous no hat, no play rule that is commonplace in Australian schools, 90s advertisements that warned the sun would give you cancer, and sunscreen tubes that stood guard at every door in her home.
It made the now 34-year-old the kind of person who religiously applies sunscreen multiple times a day and rarely leaves the house without a hat. So she was shocked when doctors found a skin cancer on her nose during a check last November, something they said was abnormal given her age and ray-dodging regime.
Though technically classified as a low grade skin cancer – a basal cell carcinoma – it had to be surgically removed, leaving the Newcastle mum with a scar just below her eye.
I was just confused, and I was a little bit angry because I was like, 'Are you kidding me?' Rach – who asked that her surname not be used – told the BBC. I thought I'd done all the right stuff and it still happened to me. That rage grew when she learned the sunscreen she had been using for years was unreliable and, according to some tests, offered next to no sun protection at all.
Independent analysis by a trusted consumer advocacy group has found that several of Australia's most popular, and expensive, sunscreens are not providing the protection they claim to, kicking off a national scandal. There has been a massive backlash from customers, a probe launched by the country's medical watchdog, multiple products pulled from shelves, and questions raised about the regulation of sunscreen around the globe.
It's definitely not an issue isolated to Australia, cosmetic chemist Michelle Wong told the BBC. Australians have a complicated relationship with the sun: they love it, but they also fear it.
The country has the highest incidence of skin cancers in the world, with estimates suggesting two out of three Australians will have at least one cut out in their lifetime. So when Choice Australia released its damning report in June, it made waves. The group had tested 20 sunscreens in an independent accredited Australian lab, finding 16 did not meet the SPF, or skin protection factor, rating listed on the packet.
Ultra Violette's Lean Screen SPF 50+ Mattifying Zinc Skinscreen, a facial product that Rach used exclusively, was the most significant failure identified. It returned a result of SPF 4, something that shocked Choice so much it commissioned a second test that produced a similar reading.
Other products that did not meet their SPF claims included those from Neutrogena, Banana Boat, Bondi Sands, and the Cancer Council - but they all rejected Choice's findings and said their own independent testing showed their sunscreens worked as advertised.
The uproar was immediate for the brands named in the report, prompting investigation from the Therapeutic Goods Administration (TGA), which said it would investigate the findings and take regulatory action as required. Ultra Violette responded by saying they were confident that Lean Screen is safe and effective and detailing extensive testing of the product. But they soon recalled the product after it returned inconsistent results across multiple lab tests, apologizing for the oversight.
As this scandal unfolds, it serves as a critical reminder of the vital need for accurate public health messaging regarding sun safety in Australia, and the potential implications for sunscreen regulations globally.
