(NaturalNews) With summer now in full swing, the corporate media is busy working itself into a frenzy over sunscreen, urging the public to slather their bodies with the stuff to avoid getting skin cancer. But as many of our readers already well know, most conventional sunscreen products are loaded with chemicals that actually cause cancer rather than prevent it -- and much to our disappointment, even the alternative media site Huffington Post is embracing the lie.

A recent piece by HuffPost writer Dana Oliver states plainly that people should wear sunscreen every day to protect their bodies against ultraviolet B (UVB) rays, the ones responsible for producing vitamin D in the body. Oliver's report cites the recommendations of Dr. Dina Strachan, a cosmetic dermatologist who recently spoke at a sunscreen industry event hosted by Hawaiian Tropic, a major manufacturer of sunscreen. Not surprisingly, Dr. Strachan is an outspoken advocate of sunscreen.

Similar to how drug companies pay off doctors with lavish vacations to push drugs at "medical" conferences, Dr. Strachan was recently hosted by a sunscreen company to advocate for sunscreen use. In other words, Dr. Strachan was paid to push sunscreen, something that should have been obvious to Oliver when writing her own piece in favor of sunscreen. But rather than seek out the facts, Oliver instead decided to push the sunscreen industry's agenda, putting millions of children at risk.

Retinyl palmitate, the deadly vitamin A derivative that causes skin cancer

Parroting the talking points of TIME and other mainstream rags, Dr. Strachan's advice concerning sunscreen use is predicated on the idea that, apart from sunscreen, the sun's UVA and UVB rays will damage your skin. Dr. Elizabeth Hale, M.D., a clinical associate professor of dermatology at the New York University (NYU) Langone Medical Center recently told TIME that up to 90 percent of skin cancers are associated with UV exposure.

But what Dr. Hale, Dr. Strachan, and many others fail to recognize -- or possibly just refuse to admit publicly -- is that sunscreen is the reason why UV rays become harmful. Many sunscreen products contain a photocarcinogenic ingredient known as retinyl palmitate, a derivative of vitamin A, that actually triggers the development of skin tumors.

As reported by the Environmental Working Group (EWG), a consumer advocacy group, numerous studies have confirmed the photocarcinogenic effects of retinyl palmitate. A panel of independent scientists convened by the National Toxicology Program, in fact, determined back in 2011 that retinyl palmitate "enhance[s] the photocarcinogenic activity" of sunlight, meaning it turns otherwise beneficial ultraviolet radiation into a silent killer.

FDA has never studied, reviewed safety of retinyl palmitate and many other sunscreen ingredients

Adding insult to injury, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has never conducted any safety testing on retinyl palmitate or any of the other chemicals commonly used in sunscreen. These chemicals have repeatedly been shown in independent tests to cause irritation, damage, and possibly even cancer in the skin, and yet they are still allowed to be used in products primarily used on small children.

"Scientists at the National Center for Toxicology Research have published more than a dozen studies showing that vitamin A derivatives react with UV light to form harmful free radicals that are toxic to the skin or that break down to harmful chemical byproducts," explains EWG in a report. "Light-induced breakdown products of vitamin A damage skin lipids and DNA strands, eventually creating skin lesions and potentially contributing to tumor formation."

Sources for this article include:

http://www.huffingtonpost.com

http://time.com

https://www.naturalnews.com/032815_sunscreen_chemicals.html

http://www.telegraph.co.uk

http://www.ewg.org