Today’s scientists have come to a dichotomous recognition that exposure to the ultraviolet (UV) radiation in sunlight has both beneficial and deleterious effects on human health. Most public health messages of the past century have focused on the hazards of too much sun exposure. UVA radiation (95–97% of the UV radiation that reaches Earth’s surface) penetrates deeply into the skin, accelerating aging of the skin and increasing the risk of skin cancers.
Excessive sun exposure can also cause cataracts and diseases aggravated by UV radiation-induced immunosuppression such as reactivation of some latent viruses. However, according to a World Health Organization (WHO) past report, excessive UV radiation exposure accounted for only 0.1% of the total global burden of disease in disability-adjusted life years (DALYs). DALYs measure how much a person’s expectancy of healthy life is reduced by premature death or disability caused by disease.
Furthermore, many diseases linked to excessive UV radiation exposure tend to be relatively benign—apart from malignant melanoma—and occur in older age groups, due mainly to the long lag between exposure and manifestation, the requirement of cumulative exposures, or both. Therefore, when measuring by DALYs, these diseases incur a relatively low disease burden despite their high prevalence.
In contrast, the same WHO report noted that a markedly larger annual disease burden of 3.3 billion DALYs worldwide might result from very low levels of UV radiation exposure. This burden subsumes major disorders of the musculoskeletal system and possibly an increased risk of various autoimmune diseases and life-threatening cancers, to name a few....READ MORE
Today’s scientists have come to a dichotomous recognition that exposure to the ultraviolet (UV) radiation in sunlight has both beneficial and deleterious effects on human...
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