The weather is beautiful, the holiday season is in the air, and it can be incredibly difficult to escape the siren call of the sun bead, a delicious cold drink and an escape to some particularly beautiful surroundings.
If you decide to spend some languid days sunbathing however, one must always bear in mind that too much sun is one of the leading causes of several signs of ageing in the skin, including wrinkles and fine lines, potentially requiring an anti-wrinkle injection over time.
Both the UVA and UVB rays lead to premature ageing signs, as well as increasing the risk of skin cancer, due to the ultraviolet rays slowly breaking down the collagen fibres in the skin as well as causing elastin fibres to accumulate at higher levels than one would expect or want.
This accumulation in turn causes the production of metalloproteinases, which in turn further break down collagen even more, causing so-called “solar scars”.
Wrinkles are caused by the repeating of this process, so what matters is overall exposure to the sun without sunscreen, coverage or other protection, rather than whether you burn or not.
None of this will be news, and it is a core reason why you should avoid tanning beds at all costs.
If you are getting a tan, you are damaging your skin, and it is essential to apply a lot of SPF 30 sunscreen, drink plenty of water and spend some time in the shade if you are worried about your skin.
Incidentally, one of the most surprising pieces of advice to some is that you need to wear sunscreen on a cloudy day as well, as 80 per cent of UV radiation from the sun can pass through light clouds, and on partial days the broken cloud effect can actually make it worse.
