Brown is Beautiful (and healthy)
Let me tell you a little known secret beauty secret: one of the best defenses against the ravages of aging doesn’t come from expensive bottles, laser beams or high-tech surgery. Nature has given to some people for free! What is this? It is brown skin, which contains melanin, the best biological shield against the photoaging effects of chronic sun exposure.
Solar radiation contains the two of the most harmful elements for the skin: UVA and UVB. Coarse wrinkles, blemishes, and sagging skin are among the visible photoaging effects of ultraviolet-A for aging, which worsen the intrinsic degenerative changes that time leaves (remember “A” for aging). The more energetic ultraviolet-B wavelength promotes sunburns and life-threatening skin cancers, commonly basal cell and squamous cell carcinomas among Filipinos, and malignant melanoma among Caucasians. Melanin receives the brunt of more than 90% of these harmful rays, not only by absorbing or scattering these, but by also acting as a “scavenger” for free radicals that cause irreversible damage at the DNA level.
Did you know that naturally brown skin has its innate sun-protection factor between 4 – 5? The words “sun-proetction factor” (“SPF”) followed by a number gives an idea how much protection is afforded against UVB rays (currently, there isn’t a grading system for UVA protection). A sunblock that is “SPF 15″, for example, means that it will take 15 times longer for skin covered with it to burn, compared to skin without it.
Substances that cause skin bleaching, when used indiscriminately, strip away this melanin defense mechanism, leaving the skin almost literally naked. Hydroquinone delivers a one-two punch by blocking melanin production and by destroying the melanocytes and melanomosomes that respectively produce and store melanin. Kojic acid is an antibiotic that inhibits an enzyme crucial to melanogenesis. Licorice, perhaps the most commonly used herb in Chinese medicine, contains glabridin, which is also a depigmenter. Other familiar names in the field of alternative medicine have been found to have some skin whitening extracts if prepared correctly. These include bearberry or nano white, and St. John’s Wort.
In view of these facts, attempts to promote the use of these skin whitening agents in order to achieve preconceived standards of beauty should, at the very least, be considered as the misguided commercialization of legitimate therapeutic options for specific skin disorders like melasma. Why stack the odds in favor of developing basal cell or squamous cell cancers, or worse, malignant melanoma that spreads so quickly? Asians like Filipinos already have an inborn shield against the sun: brown skin that contains larger and more active melanin-producing cells. But even this may not be enough protection from the cumulative effects of ultraviolet radiation.
Smoking and your skin
Smoking is the least known preventable factor underlying a number of dermatological diseases. In the July 1999 issue of the Journal of the American Academy of Dermatology, specialists at Boston University found that 78 percent of persons who light up had practically no inkling of its effects on their skin, hair and nails.
Old before Your Time
In the grand scheme of things, wrinkles or dull blotchy skin or grayish lips may not rate very high in the long list of health hazards caused by smoking.
But these complaints are among the top reasons for visits to skin-care providers.
In 1998 alone, over $2 billion was spent on “cleansing” products promising to “rejuvenate” skin. Smokers have 4.7 times more wrinkles than non-smokers.
The reason lies among the 4,000 chemicals found in tobacco fumes — carbon monoxide and hydrogen cyanide, among them.
The effects: a 38.1 percent decrease in blood flow to the skin within two minutes of inhaling (effectively cutting-off oxygen and nutrients) and damage to the collagen and elastin structural support.
These also explain why smokers have poor healing, and why scars that form are uglier. Hair and nails are not exempt from the ill effects of smoking.
Cotinine is the metabolite of nicotine that causes hair to appear dull and lifeless. Nails become brittle and have brownish discolorations. So do teeth.
In a study of 690 patients regularly examined over a 23-year period, it was found that the alveolar bone and tooth losses were twice as great in those who smoked cigarettes and cigars. Bad breath isn’t clearly the only downside to smoking.
The bottom line is that each pack consumed a day directly ages you by 1.4 years. As a professor used to say, “Why add years to your face, when you could be adding them to your life instead?”
The Big “C” and other Skin Disorders
It is common knowledge that smoking gives you lung cancer.
But do you also know that your chances of developing skin cancers of the lips and mouth increase with twofold?
These odds get worse when alcoholic drinks are consumed as well. If that doesn’t put a damper on your social life, this next fact will: cancers of the penis are much higher among men who smoke.
Do you think Viagra is going to help?
Psoriasis is an unsightly, scaling skin disease that may affect the top of your scalp, down to the tip of your toe nails.
It is basically an in inherited disease (not infectious to others) which is worsened by smoking by 55 percent.
The highest risk was found in persons who smoked 20 or more sticks a day. Other skin problems that may be aggravated by smoking include allergies, atopic dermatitis — chronic itching and dry skin — all pre-cancerous lesions.
Smoking won’t lead you to your grave right away, but it will make you appear like you’ve taken the short cut.