‘Concerning’ sunscreen contouring trend damaging young faces
Young people are causing damage to the skin on their face in a “concerning” trend dubbed sunscreen contouring, as experts warn they are seeing people in their late 20s with the skin of 50-year-olds.
Young people are causing damage to the skin on their face in a “concerning” new trend being promoted online which has been dubbed ‘sunscreen contouring’.
It comes as dermatologists say they’ve seen Gen Zs in their late 20s with the skin of people in their 50s due to tanning, with the message of staying sunsafe being lost.
This masthead has spoken to Gen Zs who say they regularly do sunscreen contouring, which involves applying cream selectively to some parts of the face and leaving others to tan.
TikToker Karoline, 22, from Brisbane said she did it to look “snatched”.
“I just used sunscreen to contour – so on my nose and cheek bones, and since I didn’t use a base layer of sunscreen it looked like my nose was pretty snatched,” she said.
But Royal Melbourne Hospital specialist dermatologist Associate Professor Vanessa Morgan urged young people to stay away from the trend because it was damaging their skin.
“You’re likely to end up with uneven pigmentation on different sides of the face, which may create melasma and unwanted side effects,” she said.
Melbourne-based medical and cosmetic dermatologist Dr Katherine Armour said she was increasingly seeing Gen Zs who had skin similar to those 20 years older than them because of sun damage.
She said there needed to be greater awareness about the importance of the slip slop slap message.
“I see women in their late 20s and early 30s who look 50 because they’ve been doing exactly what these teenagers are doing now,” Dr Armour said, when asked about the sunscreen contouring trend.
“There’s no such thing as getting a safe tan,” Associate Professor Morgan said.
“A natural tan is a sign that the DNA in [your] skin has been damaged. A tan is basically your skin trying to protect the DNA within the cells, and when the DNA gets damaged – overtime can lead to the development of both non-melanoma and melanoma skin cancers, and it absolutely leads to premature skin ageing.”
Melbourne influencer Adele Maree, 32, always tanned in her 20s but now regrets it due to the pigmentation and sunspots.
She’s joined a new campaign called #EndTheTrend, which is being run by the Cancer Council.
It tasks influencers to skip the suntan, the fake tan and the tan lines, for four weeks and share their experience with keeping their natural skin tone online.
Originally published as ‘Concerning’ sunscreen contouring trend damaging young faces
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