Nitric oxide is produced in response to UVA and this leads to vasodilation; there are also beta endorphins produced in your skin when it’s exposed to UVA and UVB
Exposure to UV light has benefits to the immune system; it affects cellular differentiation and can improve wound healing. Outdoor workers have been found to have a decreased risk of melanoma skin cancer compared to indoor workers; consumption of linoleic acid from seed oils may increase your risk of sunburn and skin cancer. The key to gaining the benefits of sunlight while minimizing the risk of sunburn is to gradually build up what Saladino refers to as your solar callus
Cancer Rates Rise With Distance From the Equator
When you put on sunscreen to “protect” your skin from the sun, you’re not only exposing your body to toxic chemicals in the sunscreen but also inhibiting the complex interactions that occur between ultraviolet (UV) light from the sun and your skin.
Nitric oxide, for instance, is produced in response to UVA and this leads to vasodilation. There are also beta endorphins produced in your skin when it’s exposed to UVA and UVB, and strong associations with cancer can be found depending on your location in relation to the equator.
“With increasing distances from the equator,” Saladino says, “we know that there are higher rates of colon, breast, pancreas, ovary, brain and kidney cancers, and the blood cancer multiple myeloma — as you move farther from the equator.” Tuberculosis is another disease that’s been correlated with sun exposure. In 1903, Niels Ryberg Finsen was awarded a Nobel Prize for his use of solar heliotherapy, or exposure to sunlight, to treat diseases such as tuberculosis.
“Once the anti-tuberculosis drugs were developed this type of therapy fell out of favor, but there were solariums there were these hospitals throughout the desert southwest. I went to medical school at the University of Arizona in Tucson and some of the places I did rotations were previously hospitals for tuberculosis patients who were put into the sun, and there was some improvement in their disease,” Saladino explains.
Exposure to UV light also has benefits to the immune system. “It affects cellular differentiation. It can improve wound healing … I don’t think many people think about putting their wounds in the sun to help with healing, but the sun does help.”
Sunlight Benefits From Vitamin D and Beyond
The fact that your skin produces vitamin D in response to sun exposure is another clue that it’s beneficial. Vitamin D upregulates your ability to fight infections, as well as chronic inflammation, and produces over 200 antimicrobial peptides (AMPs), one of which is cathelicidin, a naturally occurring broad-spectrum antibiotic.
The cathelicidin antimicrobial peptide, or CAMP, is made by immune cells and skin and gut cells, which act as a barrier to infection. A wealth of data also show that vitamin D levels are strongly correlated with the severity of SARS-CoV-2 infection. Saladino has visited the Hadza tribe in Africa, who are among the best still-living representations of the way humans have lived for tens of thousands of years.
He credits their regular sun exposure, as well as their native diet, for their lack of chronic diseases seen in modernized societies:
“There is good observational epidemiological research that levels of vitamin D above 30 nanograms per milliliter (ng/mL) were quite protective and if we think about this evolutionarily, groups like the Hadza and the Maasai evolve at the equator. They have a lineage there that is many hundreds, thousands of years old.
Their vitamin D averages around 46 to 48 ng/mL, which I suggest is an evolutionarily appropriate level and probably good for most humans.”
To ward off infection and prevent chronic diseases, the level you're aiming for is between 60 and 80 ng/mL, with 40 ng/mL being the low cutoff point for sufficiency to prevent a wide range of diseases, including cancer. The key is to get your vitamin D from the sun, not supplements. It’s important to understand that vitamin D is not the only benefit of sunlight. In fact, vitamin D is more than likely a biomarker or surrogate for sun exposure, which is also intricately involved in melatonin production.
During the day, if you get proper sun exposure, near-infrared rays from the sun penetrate deep into your body and activate cytochrome c oxidase, which in turn stimulates the production of melatonin inside your mitochondria. Your mitochondria produce ATP, the energy currency of your body. A byproduct of this ATP production is the creation of reactive oxidative species (ROS), which are responsible for oxidative stress and free radicals.
Excessive amounts of ROS will damage the mitochondria, contributing to suboptimal health, inflammation and chronic health conditions such as diabetes, obesity and thrombosis (blood clots). But melatonin essentially mops up ROS that damage your mitochondria. So by getting plenty of sun exposure during the day, your mitochondria will be bathed in melatonin, thereby reducing oxidative stress. Saladino adds:
“I would advise you to get your vitamin D from real sunlight because of the other benefits of real sunlight — endorphins, nitric oxide, perhaps other cholesterol molecules like cholesterol sulfate. We don't even, I think, understand all of the benefits of being in the sun. There are so many associations with latitude that suggest it could be deeper than vitamin D.”
Build Up Your Solar Callus
The key to gaining the benefits of sunlight while minimizing the risk of sunburn is not to use sunscreen, which typically contains endocrine-disrupting chemicals, but rather to build up what Saladino refers to as your solar callus:
“If you are light skin, cover up, get a small amount of sun exposure, develop your solar callus … get that UVA and UVB into the different layers of your skin. Get that UVB-producing melanin gradually dark and gradually think about being in the sun. As a piece of homework that is my prescription for you, get into the sun gradually … this is your chance to fill up your sun reserves.
That's vitamin D and other compounds that are produced from the sun in your skin and stored in your body but do that gradually. If you're going to be out in the sun too long to safely be in the sun without burning based on your relative amount of melanin in your skin, then cover yourself.”
Be aware, however, that your diet also plays a significant role in your propensity for sunburn. High intake of linoleic acid raises your risk for sunburn while eliminating seed oils from your diet will dramatically reduce your risk of sunburn and skin cancer, as susceptibility to UV radiation damage is controlled by the level of PUFAs in your diet.
It’s almost like a dial. The PUFAs control how rapidly your skin burns, and how rapidly you develop skin cancer. Saladino points out that psoralens, which are found in certain plant foods like celery and parsnips, can also be problematic, as they make your skin more sensitive to sunlight. The take-home message, however, that Saladino stresses is this:
Most skin disorders are caused by heavy metals and viral activity in the body. Hook a international healing session with Healer Omar Botha.“Do not fear the sun, my friends. Don't get burned, but do not fear the sun — put it on your whole body, see how it feels … If you are in a place where you cannot get sun for much of the year either consider moving or I would consider a tanning bed look for perhaps a tanning bed that has some level of UVA and UVB that mimics the sun.”
Some people may have more of the toxic heavy metal mercury causing neurological symptoms; some people may have more toxic copper causing skin conditions.
