About the Author N adim A. Shaath, PhD, President Alpha Research & Development Ltd. Dr. Nadim Shaath received his PhD in organic chemistry from the University of Minnesota. He then joined the faculty at the State University of New York at Purchase and served as the chairman of the Chemistry Department at SUNY-Purchase. He was the president and CEO of KATO Worldwide, a fl avor, fragrance, sunscreen, and essential oil company, and is currently the president of ALPHA Research and Development, Ltd., a research, sourcing, and product development com- pany in the fi elds of essential oils, aromatherapy, and sunscreens. Dr. Shaath is a frequent speaker/moderator at many scientifi c meetings and is the author of numerous articles in chemical, pharmaceutical, cosmetic, essential oils, and sunscreen journals and publications. He writes a bimonthly column in HAPPI magazine entitled The Sunscreen Filter. He is one of the founding members of the PASS (Public Access to Safe Sunscreens) Coalition in Washington DC that successfully lobbied Congress to issue the Sunscreen Innovation Act (SIA) signed by President Obama in 2014. He is the author of four books on sunscreens and ultraviolet fi lters including the widely distributed book entitled Sunscreens published by Taylor & Francis (2005). He has recently published his new coffee-table book entitled Healing Civilizations: The Search for Therapeutic Essential Oils and Nutrients (2017), Cameron Books, Petaluma, CA. May 2020

J. Cosmet. Sci., 71, 227–231 (July/August 2020) 227 Impact of Sunscreen Regulations in the United States on Suncare Development NADIM A. SHAATH , PhD, Alpha Research & Development, Ltd., New York, NY It is estimated that fi ve million skin cancer incidences are diagnosed in about three mil- lion patients in the United States annually (1% of the population). These incidences of skin cancer are more than breast, prostate, lung, and colon cancers combined. There are about a 100,000 new cases of malignant melanomas (MM), the deadliest form of skin cancer, and almost 10,000 die each year from MM (1). It is well known that skin cancer is due mostly from ultraviolet radiation, although credible evidence has surfaced that other wavelengths of the solar spectrum, most notably the high- energy frequency visible rays, and the infrared rays may also cause damage to the skin (2,3). Concerns that I—and others—have expressed for many years about burgeoning skin can- cer rates also pertain to the development of ultraviolet fi lters incorporated into sunscreens in the United States. Presently, in the United States, with the exception of zinc and tita- nium oxides, the fi lters are poorly designed and rely on technology developed in the last century, and thus they are all smaller molecules of molecular weights (MW) (Daltons) of less than 400. This makes them less effi cient in ultraviolet (UV) absorbance, protecting predominantly in the UVB region, with the molecules small enough to permeate the bloodstream when applied to the skin. As the new U. S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) data revealed (which will be discussed in more detail later in this article), all the small molecule fi lters tend to penetrate the skin. The Centers for Disease Control reported that oxybenzone was found in the breast milk of mothers as well as in the blood of 96% of Americans who were tested (4) . As new data surface about skin cancer incidences and the lack of adequate ultraviolet fi l- ters to protect us from UV radiation, in particular the UVA region, it is obvious that scientists and regulators need to triple their efforts in protecting the consumer. Of the 16 fi lters currently approved by the FDA, only four UV fi lters offer some protection from the UVA region. They are avobenzone (which, unfortunately, is photo unstable), oxybenzone (which is currently under severe attack from environmentalists and the medical commu- nity), menthyl anthranilate (which practically no one uses), and fi nally zinc oxide (which has its own challenges in formulations). On February 26, 2019, the FDA proposed new rules governing the regulation of sunscreens in the United States (5). If approved (see discussions in the following text), then it will basically render zinc oxide and titanium Address all correspondence to Nadim A. Shaath at alpharnd@aol.com