Dermatology's Disastrous War Against The Sun
The forgotten side of skin health and the necessity of sunlight
by A Midwestern Doctor
Story at a Glance:
•Skin cancers are by far the most commonly diagnosed cancer in the United States, so to prevent them, the public is constantly told to avoid the sun. However, while the relatively benign skin cancers are caused by sun exposure, the ones responsible for most skin cancer deaths are due to a lack of sunlight.
•This is unfortunate because sunlight is arguably the most important nutrient for the human body, as avoiding it doubles one’s rate of dying and significantly increases their risk of cancer.
•A strong case can be made that this dynamic was a result of the dermatology profession (with the help of a top PR firm) rebranding themselves to skin cancer fighters, something which allowed them to become one of the highest paying medical specialities in existence. Unfortunately, despite the billions that is put into fighting it each year, there has been no substantial change in the number of skin cancer deaths.
•In this article, we will also discuss the dangers of the conventional skin cancer treatments, the most effective ways for treating and preventing skin cancer, and some of the best strategies for having a healthy and nourishing relationship with the sun.
Note: in February’s open thread, I presented some potential articles, and since this topic was one of the most requested, I have spent the last month working on it.
Ever since I was a little child something seemed off about the fact everyone would get hysterical about how I needed to avoid sunlight and always wear sunscreen whenever we had an outdoor activity—so to the best of my ability I just didn’t comply. As I got older, I started to notice that beyond the sun feeling really good, anytime I was in the sun, the veins under my skin that were exposed to the sun would dilate, which I took as a sign the body craved sunlight and wanted it to draw into the circulation. Later still, I learned a pioneering researcher found significant alternations would occur in the health of people who wore glasses that blocked specific light spectrums (e.g., most glass blocks UV light) from entering the most transparent part of the body that could be treated by giving them specialized glasses which did not block that spectrum from entering.
Note: all the above touches upon one of my favorite therapeutic modalities—ultraviolet blood irradiation, which will be the focus of an upcoming article.
Later, when I became a medical student (at which point I was familiar with the myriad of benefits of sunlight), I was struck by how neurotic dermatologists were about avoiding sunlight—for instance, in addition to hearing every patient I saw there be lectured about the importance of avoiding sunlight, through my classmates, I learned of dermatologists in the northern latitudes (which had low enough sunlight people suffered from seasonal affective disorder) effectively require their students to wear sunscreen and clothing which covered most of their body while indoors. At this point my perspective on the issue changed to “this crusade against the sun is definitely coming from the dermatologists” and “what on earth is wrong with these people?” A few years ago I learned the final piece of the puzzle through Robert Yoho MD and his book Butchered by Healthcare.
The Monopolization of Medicine
Throughout my life, I’ve noticed three curious patterns in the medical industry:
•They will promote healthy activities people are unlikely to do (e.g., exercising or smoking cessation).
•They will promote clearly unhealthy activities industries make money from (e.g., eating processed foods or taking a myriad of unsafe and ineffective pharmaceuticals).
•They will attack clearly beneficial activities that are easy to do (e.g., sunlight exposure, eating eggs, consuming raw dairy, or eating butter).
As best as I can gather, much of this is rooted in the scandalous history of the American Medical Association, when in 1899, George H. Simmons, MD took possession of the floundering organization (MDs were going out of business because their treatments were barbaric and didn’t work). He, in turn, started a program to give the AMA seal of approval in return for the manufacturers disclosing their ingredients and agreeing to advertise in a lot of AMA publications (they were not however required to prove their product was safe or effective). This maneuver was successful, and in just ten years, increased their advertising revenues 5-fold, and their physician membership 9-fold.
At the same time this happened, the AMA moved to monopolize the medical industry by doing things such as establishing a general medical education council (which essentially said their method of practicing medicine was the only credible way to practice medicine) which allowed them to then become the national accrediting body for medical schools. This in turn allowed them to end the teaching of many of the competing models of medicine such as homeopathy, chiropractic, naturopathy, and to a lesser extent, osteopathy—as states would often not give licenses to graduates of schools with a poor AMA rating.
Likewise, Simmons (along with his successor, Fishbein, who reigned from 1924 to 1950) established a "Propaganda Department" in 1913 to attack all unconventional medical treatments and anyone (MD or not) who practiced them. Fishbein was very good at what he did and could often organize massive media campaigns against anything he elected to deem “quackery” that were heard by millions of Americans (at a time when the country was much smaller).
After Simmons and Fishbein created this monopoly, they were quick to leverage it. This included blackmailing pharmaceutical companies to advertise with them, demanding the rights for a variety of healing treatments to be sold to the AMA, and sending the FDA or FTC after anyone who refused to sell out (which in at least in one case was proved in court since one of Fishbein’s “compatriots” thought what he was doing was wrong and testified against him). Because of this, many remarkable medical innovations were successfully erased from history (part of my life’s work and much of what I use in practice are essentially the therapies Simmons and Fishbein largely succeeded in wiping off the Earth).
Note: to illustrate that this is not just ancient history, consider how viciously and ludicrously the AMA attacked the use of ivermectin to treat COVID (as it was the biggest competitor to the COVID cartel). Likewise, one of the paradigm changing moments for Pierre Kory (which he discusses with Russel Brand here) was that after he testified to the Senate about ivermectin, he was put into a state of shock by the onslaught of media and medical journal campaigns from every direction trying to tank ivermectin and destroy he and his colleagues’ reputations (e.g., they got fired and had their papers which had already passed peer-review retracted). Two weeks into it, he got an email from Professor William B Grant (a vitamin D expert) that said “Dear Dr. Korey, what they're doing to ivermectin they've been doing to vitamin D for decades” and included a 2017 paper detailing the exact playbook industry uses again and again to bury inconvenient science.
Before long, Big Tobacco became the AMA’s biggest client, which led to countless ads like this one being published by the AMA which persisted until Fishbein was forced out (at which point he became a highly paid lobbyist for the tobacco industry):
Note: because of how nasty they were, they often got people to dig into their past, at which point it was discovered how unscrupulous and sociopathic both Simmons and Fishbein were. Unfortunately, while I know from first-hand experience this was the case (e.g., a friend of mine knew Fishbein’s secretary and she stated that Fishbein was a truly horrible person she regularly saw carry out despicable actions and I likewise knew people who knew the revolutionary healers Fishbein targeted), I was never able to confirm many of the abhorrent allegations against Simmons because the book they all cite as a reference did not provide its sources, while the other books which provide different but congruent allegations are poorly sourced.
The Benefits of Sunlight
One of the oldest “proven” therapies in medicine was having people bathe in sunlight (e.g., it was one of the few things that actually had success in treating the 1918 influenza, prior to antibiotics it was one of the most effective treatments for treating tuberculosis and it was also widely used for a variety of other diseases). In turn, since it is safe, effective, and freely available, it stands to reason that unscrupulous individuals who wanted to monopolize the practice of medicine would want to cut off the public’s access to it.
Note: the success of sunbathing was the original inspiration for ultraviolet blood irradiation.
Because of how successful the war against sunlight has been many people are unaware of its benefits. For example:
1. Sunlight is critical for mental health. This is most well appreciated with depression (e.g., seasonal affective disorder) but in reality the effects are far more broad reaching (e.g., unnatural light exposure destroys your circadian rhythm).
Note: I really got this point during my medical internship, where after a long period of night shifts under fluorescent lights, noticed I was becoming clinically depressed (which has never otherwise happened to me and led to a co-resident I was close to offering to prescribe antidepressants). I decided to do an experiment (I do this a lot—e.g., I try to never recommend treatments to patients I haven’t already tried on myself) and stuck with it for a few more days, then went home and bathed under a full spectrum bulb, at which point I almost instantly felt better. I feel my story is particularly important for healthcare workers since many people in the system are forced to spend long periods of their under artificial light and their mental health (e.g., empathy) suffers greatly from it. For example, consider this study of Chinese operating room nurses which found their mental health was significantly worse than the general population and that this decline was correlated to their lack of sunlight exposure.
2. A large epidemiological study found women with higher solar UVB exposure had only half the incidence of breast cancer as those with lower solar exposure and that men with higher residential solar exposure had only half the incidence of fatal prostate cancer.
Note: a 50% reduction in either of these cancers greatly exceeds what any of the approaches we use to treat or prevent them have accomplished.
3. A 20 year prospective study evaluated 29,518 women in Southern Sweden where average women from each age bracket with no significant health issues were randomly selected, essentially making it one of the best possible epidemiologic studies that could be done. It found that women who were sun avoidant compared to those who had regular exposure to sunlight were:
•Overall 60% more likely to die, being roughly 50% more likely to die than the moderate exposure group and roughly 130% increase more likely to die than the group with high sun exposure.
Note: to be clear, there are very few interventions in medicine that do anything close to this.
•The largest gain was seen in the risk of dying from heart disease, while the second gain was seen in the risk of all causes of death besides heart disease and cancer (“other”), and the third largest gain was seen in deaths from cancer.
Note: the investigators concluded the smaller benefit in reduced cancer deaths was in part an artifact of the subjects living longer and hence succumbing to a type of cancer that would have only affected them later in life.
• The largest benefit was seen in smokers, to the point non-smokers who avoided the sun had the same risk of dying as smokers who got sunlight.
Note: I believe this and the cardiovascular benefits are in large part due to sunlight catalyzing the synthesis of nitric oxide (which is essential for healthy blood vessels) and sulfates (which coat cells like the endothelium and in conjunction with infrared (or sunlight) creates the liquid crystalline water which is essential for the protection and function of the cardiovascular system).
So given all of this, I would say that you need a really good justification to avoid sun exposure.
Skin Cancer
According to the American Academy of Dermatology:
Skin cancer is the most common cancer in the United States. Current estimates are that one in five Americans will develop skin cancer in their lifetime. It is estimated that approximately 9,500 people in the U.S. are diagnosed with skin cancer every day.
Basal cell and squamous cell carcinomas, the two most common forms of skin cancer, are highly treatable if detected early and treated properly.
Because exposure to UV light is the most preventable risk factor for all skin cancers, the American Academy of Dermatology encourages everyone to stay out of indoor tanning beds and protect their skin outdoors by seeking shade, wearing protective clothing — including a long-sleeved shirt, pants, a wide-brimmed hat and sunglasses with UV protection — and applying a broad-spectrum, water-resistant sunscreen with an SPF of 30 or higher to all skin not covered by clothing.
Likewise according to the Skin Cancer Foundation:
More than 2 people die of skin cancer in the U.S. every hour.
That’s sounds pretty scary. Let’s now break down exactly what that means.
Note: fortunately, there is much more awareness of the vast benefits of vitamin D now (which comes from sunlight exposure). However, since many of the sun's benefits come from things besides creating vitamin D, the current position dermatology is beginning to pivot to (that you can substitute “unsafe” sunlight exposure with vitamin D) is not advice I can at all support.
Basal Cell Carcinoma
By far the most common type of skin cancer is basal cell carcinoma (comprising 80% of all skin cancers), which for reference looks like this:
The exact incidence of BCC varies greatly, ranging from 14 to 10,000 cases per million persons, and within the United States, it is generally believed that around 2.64 million people get one per year (with around 4.32 million total cancers occurring since some people get more than one). The three primary risk factors for BCC are excessive sun exposure, fair skin (which makes you more susceptible to excessive sunlight penetrating your skin), and a family history of skin cancer. Because of this, the widely varying incidence of BCC is largely due to how much sunlight exposure people have, and typically you find it in areas with frequent sunlight exposure (e.g., the face).
The important thing to understand about BCC is that because it almost never metastasizes, it is not very dangerous. Most sources say it has a 0% fatality rate. Instead, it’s normally evaluated by how likely it is to recur once it's removed (which ranges from 65% to 95%, depending on the source).
Note: we feel one of the biggest shortcomings in the excision based approach to skin cancer is that it does not address the underlying causes of cancer, it can frequently lead to skin cancers recurring and more and more skin needing to be cut off (which becomes problematic as more of it is removed). This in turn is particularly problematic when a potentially deadly one recurs.
However, while BCC’s never kill you, in some cases, if left alone for years, they can slowly grow to be quite large, at which point, removing them can become disfiguring (this is a common issue dermatologists in poorer areas run into). In turn, when it is clear you have a BCC, you do want to do something about it, however its not at all urgent. Fortunately, there are instances (discussed below) of the alternative therapies for BCCs still working when the tumor had grow quite large and was no longer possible to remove surgically without it being disfiguring.
Squamous Cell Carcinoma
The second most common type of skin cancer, cutaneous Squamous Cell Carcinoma (SCC) looks as follows:
Since it is also caused by sunlight, its incidence varies greatly, ranging from 260 to 4970 per million person-years, with an estimated 1.8 million cases occurring each year in the United States. Previously, BCC was thought to occur around 4 times as often as SCC, but now that gap has closed to it only being twice as common. Unlike BCC, SCC can be dangerous, as it does metastasize. In turn, if it is removed prior to metastasizing, it has a 99% survival rate, but if removed after metastasis, this drops to 56%. As SCC is typically caught before this happens (in 1-2 years, 3-9% of them will metastasize), the average survival rate for this cancer is around 95%, and around 2000 people (although some estimates go as high as 8000) are thought to die from SCC each year in the United States.
Note: since BCC and SCC are unlikely to kill people, unlike the other skin cancers, doctors are not required to report them, and there is hence no centralized database tabulating how many of them occur. As a result, the BCC and SCC numbers are largely estimates.
Melanoma
Melanoma is estimated to occur at a rate of 218 cases per million persons in the United States each year (with the risk varying by ethnicity). However, despite only comprising 1% of all skin cancer diagnoses, Melanoma is responsible for most of the deaths from skin cancer. Since survival is greatly improved by early detection, many guides online exist to help one recognize the common signs of a potential melanoma:
The five year survival rate for melanoma depends upon how far it has spread at the time of its diagnosis (ranging from 99% to 35% and averaging out to 94%), which again makes it important to correctly identify—but likewise, some cases are aggressive and metastasize quickly (so they often don’t get caught in time) and those variants have between a 15-22.5% survival rate. In total, this works out to a bit over 8000 deaths each year in the United States.
Note: these melanoma variants likely distort the overall survival statistics about the cancer.
What’s critically important to understand about melanoma is that while it’s widely considered to be linked to sunlight exposure—it’s not. For example:
•A study of 528 patients with melanoma found those who had solar elastosis (a common change in the skin that follows excessive sun exposure) were 60% less likely to die from melanoma.
•87% of all SCC cases occur in regions of the body that have significant sunlight exposure, such as the face (which in total comprises 6.2% of its surface area), while 82.5% of BCC occur in those regions. Conversely, only 22% of melanomas occur in these regions. This indicates that SCC and BCC are linked to sun exposure, but melanoma is not, and this is congruent with the fact that we constantly find them in areas that get almost no sunlight exposure
•Outdoor workers get 3–10 times the annual UV dose that indoor workers get, yet they have lower incidences of cutaneous malignant melanoma and an odds ratio (risk) that is half that of their outdoor colleagues.
•A 1997 meta analysis of the available literature found workers with significant occupational sunlight exposure were 14% less likely to get melanoma.
•Existing research has found using sunscreen either has no effect on the rates of malignant melanoma or increases it, which makes it quite frustrating that governments around the world always parrot the advice to wear more of it, especially whenever melanoma rates are rising (in other words, exactly what we also see with the COVID-19 vaccine drives).
Note: a case can be made that the chemicals in sunscreen cause skin cancer, and likewise some evidence exists for this with certain cosmetic products on the market.
•A (now forgotten) 1982 study of 274 women found that fluorescent light exposure at work caused a 2.1 times increase in their risk of developing malignant melanoma, with this risk increasing with more fluorescent light exposure, either due to the exposure at their job (1.8X with moderate exposure jobs, 2.6X with high exposure jobs) or the time spent working at it (i.e., 2.4X more likely for 1-9 year of work, 2.8X for 10-19 years, and 4.1X for over 20 years).
Note: there is some evidence these lights also affect animals (e.g., this study showed they dramatically dropped milk production).
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