Palau is First Country To Ban 'Reef Toxic' Sun Cream (bbc.com) 46
The Pacific nation of Palau has become the first country to ban sun cream that is harmful to corals and sea life. From a report: From Wednesday, sun cream that includes common ingredients, including oxybenzone, is not allowed to be worn or sold in the country. Palau's President Tommy Remengesau said: "We have to live and respect the environment because the environment is the nest of life." The island nation markets itself as a "pristine paradise" for divers. A lagoon in Palau's Rock Islands is a Unesco World Heritage site. The country has a population of around 20,000 dotted across hundreds of islands. The ban -- which was announced in 2018 - prohibits sun cream containing any of 10 ingredients. The list includes oxybenzone and octinoxate, which absorb ultraviolet light.
The International Coral Reef Foundation said the banned chemicals were "known environmental pollutants -- most of them are... incredibly toxic to juvenile stages of many wildlife species."
Maybe they are right (Score:1)
Maybe they are right but I'd love to see the science that says the tiny amount of those chemicals that are going to be present from sunscreen is actually harmful as they are asserting. The article says:
Mr Remengesau told the AFP news agency: "When science tells us that a practice is damaging to coral reefs, to fish populations, or to the ocean itself, our people take note and our visitors do too.
But no citation is given there either.
Re:Maybe they are right (Score:5, Informative)
For your reading pleasure:
Toxicopathological Effects of the Sunscreen UV Filter, Oxybenzone (Benzophenone-3), on Coral Planulae and Cultured Primary Cells and Its Environmental Contamination in Hawaii and the U.S. Virgin Islands [springer.com]
Toxicological effects of the sunscreen UV filter, benzophenone-2, on planulae and in vitro cells of the coral, Stylophora pistillata [springer.com]
Skincare Chemicals and Coral Reefs [noaa.gov]
Re:Maybe they are right (Score:4, Informative)
The LC50 of planulae exposed to oxybenzone in the light for an 8- and 24-h exposure was 3.1 mg/L and 139 g/L, respectively. The LC50s for oxybenzone in darkness for the same time points were 16.8 mg/L and 779 g/L. Deformity EC20 levels (24 h) of planulae exposed to oxybenzone were 6.5 g/L in the light and 10 g/L in darkness. Coral cell LC50s (4 h, in the light) for 7 different coral species ranges from 8 to 340 g/L, whereas LC20s (4 h, in the light) for the same species ranges from 0.062 to 8 g/L. Coral reef contamination of oxybenzone in the U.S. Virgin Islands ranged from 75 g/L to 1.4 mg/L, whereas Hawaiian sites were contaminated between 0.8 and 19.2 g/L.
Information like this, a link at least, should have been in the article.
Thanks for the cite.
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For the other readers: Slashdot deleted the mu symbol. For g/L, read ug/L.
One bottle of sunscreen (assuming 10% concentration) can turn 4e+5 m3 of water (166 olympic swimming pools) into corral poison (at 0.06 ug/L).
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If you dig in to this, these studies were paid for by a sunscreen company based in hawaii, that primarily only is sold in hawaii. Since you can't cary many liquids on the plan to this island, you are forced into buying their monopolized product. There was quite an uproar from the scientific community that the science in these studies was bunk at best, and appears to be a play to sell more sunscreen by a specific company. The amount of the chemical in the water, even with many tourists, is an order of magnit
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Since you can't cary many liquids on the plan to this island, you are forced into buying their monopolized product.
Uhh... What? I've seen at least half a dozen brands of sunscreen on Hawaii, including tons of sprayable ones.
Any generic titanium dioxide sunscreen cream is also fine.
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Government officials looking for an excuse to give economic advantage to their buddies is standard operating procedure around the world.
Even for valid issues (for varying definitions of valid) you still need to keep an eye in real motivations for shading things one way or the other to benefit the buddies. Dow was sent into bankruptcy for bad science about silicone breast implants. And you are currently being played like a song about anti-vaping, driven by the tobacco companies, who own Juul, in a 4D chess
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The correct answer is more science, which he quoted, and you directed out of hand.
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Rejected
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Maybe they are right but I'd love to see the science that says the tiny amount of those chemicals that are going to be present from sunscreen is actually harmful as they are asserting. The article says:
Mr Remengesau told the AFP news agency: "When science tells us that a practice is damaging to coral reefs, to fish populations, or to the ocean itself, our people take note and our visitors do too.
But no citation is given there either.
citation or not, how come multinational corporations are allowed to sell harmful crap ... the product testing regime is clearly corrupt
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Banned in Hawaii too (Score:2)
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Or is the tired old Boomer whining that we are blocking some either outdated and harmful product because we have better and safer ones out there
Titanium dioxide is a mineral-based sunscreen that has been around for longer than these chemical ones. But it doesn't come in a spray bottle, and it's more expensive to make. Convenience and profits have gotten in the way of perfectly good sunscreen.
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Am I to assume from this statement that you favour the Government providing electric cars for everyone?
Electric cars are going to be the way to go, in the long run. Alas, they're expensive, and not everyone is in the market for a
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No you are trying to twist my words around.
There are some products which we will naturally move towards to over time, so we don't need any government rules or restrictions for. Other products may need a small insensitive for people to cross the line, in cases where they are viable alternatives and your product causes more harm then its benefit. Then you can bring up the case on banning it.
Government shouldn't be demanding Electric Cars until as you stated the Average American can't afford them. However Su
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...so we don't need any government rules or restrictions for. Other products may need a small insensitive[sic] for people to cross the line, in cases where they are viable alternatives...
I wouldn't bet my coastlines on tourists stepping up to do the right thing.
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There are alternative sunscreens out there that are effective.
Zinc oxide works pretty well and is (reportedly) reef safe. The only down side: Now you have some poor really, really white folks.
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It's unclear from your post - but if you're referring to doing things like going to Palau - you could, you know, stop going.
I still can't get over the dive community bitching about environmental damage to reefs when I can't think of a more eco-unfriendly sport. Flying, driving, boating to dive sites, generally just to swim with fish (and obviously huge turtles), wrecks, caves, and sure, nudibranchs, all the gear, air compression, etc; then that community has the gall to bitch about what anyone else is doin
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Try Blue Lizard - most of their formulas are oxybenzone-free and it is fairly runny. It also tests highly in terms of delivering the SPF they advertise. I use it on both our pale children and myself.
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I can sympathize - not particularly pale, but I do burn, and hairy arms and legs makes applying sunscreen a real bitch. I really dislike the chemical stuff, however (think it's the smell), so I've been building a collection of mineral sunscreens as I hunt for one that works. The organic stuff is junk, as you point out, but there's some pretty good lesser-known brands out there that spread and work well. Bare Republic is now my go-to stuff for face, and while I look like a ghost when I use the stuff, at leas
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Well, to be fair, decades of abuse by hordes of tourists, many of whom don't properly apply the sunscreen indoors then wait for it to dry before going into the water, even. But that's beside the point. Those decades have passed, and now we know for sure coral is dead because of it. And now that we know, there's no reason to keep going in that direction if there are safer alternatives.
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Follow up: It is important to save the coral to prevent from coastal erosion. Without coral we all live in Kevin Costner's Water World eventually. You don't want Water World, do you?
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missed Slashvertisement opportunity... (Score:1)
Which brands can we trust to be safe for the coral now but still protect sufficiently against harmful UV rays?
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It looks like the trick is to use mineral-based products rather than chemical-based products. Old fashioned non-nano zinc oxide is what you want, the stuff all lifeguards smear on their noses.
Reef Friendly Criteria [allgoodproducts.com]
Not advocating or endorsing, but this comes up high on search engines. Caveat emptor:
Mineral Sunscreens [allgoodproducts.com]
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Which brands can we trust to be safe for the coral now but still protect sufficiently against harmful UV rays?
Just look for the "Reef Safe" on the label.
In Hawaii or Palau, just buy anything on the shelf, since the banned sunscreens can't be sold.
Reef safe chemicals work fine. They just cost a few pennies more.
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Hmm, a shirt and a hat, work quite well and look for shade. Even if you readily change colour with regard to exposure to sunlight, you should still consider limiting exposure. If you burn quite readily, I would suggest avoid holidays to destinations where that will occur, just common sense. Don't buy into all the advertising, it is not life changing, people just say it because they have been marketed into believing it, they come back not changed at all, just parroting a very profitable marketing delusion.
C
and (Score:2)
they get free advertising for their pristine beaches and lagoons
However I don't think you can get a direct flight there from MSP
How do you police it? (Score:2)
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They're an island - it's either airport or boat. Most countries have a customs process for bringing anything in from outside the country. Probably the most important aspects are no imports for retail and no stores carrying it.
it's good that there are alternative sunscreens, but are they effective.
These are already the alternative (they're chemicals and easier to put into a spray). Zinc oxide and titanium oxide have been around for many decades longer.
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You post that it is banned and explain why.
Believe it or not, most people are not complete assholes and will happily fork over $10 for a bottle of sunscreen if you explain that small amount of what they have can destroy the paradise they just paid a huge amount of money to get to. For the few that are douchebags, they'll be arrogant to apply their coral poison of choice out on the beach where some islander can get half his normal yearly salary from reporting the bitch.
I never really understood the whole "p
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You do realise that liquids already get checked at the airport before departure? What exactly makes it impossible to check them again on arrival?
I thought this already happened. (Score:2)
Huh, I thought Palau had already instituted this ban. I learned something new. Thanks.