In his Sunday column in the Montreal Gazette, McGill University chemistry professor Dr. Joseph Schwarcz wrote a commonsense article that effectively debunked the Environmental Working Group’s (EWG) myth that the sunscreen additive retinyl palmitate causes cancer.
The fact is that you can take practically any chemical and construct a scary scenario by referring to the literature selectively. Want to show that oakmoss, present in numerous scented products, is phototoxic? No problem. How about lavender? Well, that's estrogenic. And zinc oxide or titanium dioxide? These are two of the most effective sunblocks. They come highly recommended, justifiably, by EWG. But just dredge the literature and you'll find that when exposed to ultraviolet light, they can trigger the formation of skin-damaging free radicals! Indeed, it wouldn't be difficult to concoct a press release about the dangers of zinc oxide or titanium dioxide and scare people half to death. But it would be ridiculous. The benefits these compounds offer in protection from UV exposure far outweigh any risk.
“He neatly skewers public relations experts at EWG who try to pose as scientists, pointing out that their main goal is to generate scary publicity and gain recruits,” says ACSH's Dr. Elizabeth Whelan.