Your sunscreen, my sunscreen, all of our goddamn sunscreen is contributing to the death of Earth’s coral reefs. In addition to killing the coral, the chemical also damages the DNA in adults and deforms the DNA in corals that are in the larval stage, which reduces corals’ chances of proper development, according to a news release.
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“It may be that oxybenzone makes the baby corals encase themselves in their own skeletons, creating their own coffins”, he said.
Even more worrying, scientists observed the harmful effects of the chemical even when it was highly diluted – as low as 62 parts per trillion, or the same as “a drop of water in six and a half Olympic-sized swimming pools”, the study found. And it isn’t just beachgoers who are at fault. No matter where you live, your skincare products wash off in the shower and wind up in a local waterway.
“Oxybenzone pollution predominantly occurs in swimming areas, but it also occurs on reefs 5-20 miles from the coastline as a result of submarine freshwater seeps that can be contaminated with sewage”, said Bronstein.
The study was led by marine scientists from Virginia, Florida, Israel, the US National Aquarium and the US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.
We all know the coral reefs are in trouble. The fact that humans are making this human-caused problem even worse by tanning is just sad.
The researchers noted concentrations of oxybenzone several times above the threshold in several areas – the highest concentration was 1,400,000 parts per trillion in Trunk Bay, a popular area in the U.S. Virgin Islands National Park.
“We’re contaminating the ocean with a whole range of stuff which we have little idea of what the real risk is”, he said.
Oxybenzone – also known as BP-3 or Benzophenone-3 – is found in more than 3,500 sunscreen products worldwide, said the study in the latest edition of the Archives of Environmental Contamination and Toxicology.
Thankfully, there’s a pretty straightforward solution here: stop wearing sunscreen that contains this nasty shit.
Downs said people should read sunscreen ingredients carefully. If you wear Coppertone, L’Oreal Paris, Hawaiian Tropic, Banana Boat, or another major brand name, you’ll probably find oxybenzone. In fact, a severe worldwide bleaching event is now underway – the third one in recorded history – and it’s set to damage 38 percent of the planet’s reefs, with 12,000 square kilometres expected to die out this year. If you don’t like any of those, these ones are ecologically responsible as well, though you may have to do a bit of hunting to get them in Australia.
With temperatures falling, we’re definitely not hitting the beach and slathering on sunscreen quite as much as a couple months ago, unless we’re heading south to warmer climates.
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Top: A completely bleached coral photographed in Hawaii during the main islands’ first ever mass bleaching event in late 2014. This isn’t. Let’s all do our part to solve it.
