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Spray tanning may cause harm...to your pride

By Kate Kowsh

July 10, 2006

San Diego--You’ve seen them, those overconfident, sun-kissed imposters with their radioactive orange glows. Like lost inhabitants of some nuclear test site, this new breed has joined our midst, confidently sporting tans a few shades removed from natural. It’s all thanks to airbrush tanning, the latest fad in the quest for the perfect tan.

It’s there that some quasi-professional, wielding an airbrush gun, hands victims a shower cap, asks them to disrobe and proceeds to spray a sticky, caramel colored mist all over their body. Then, after the mist dries into the skin, the subjects are turned loose—two or three shades darker than when they arrived.

According to www.mystictan.com, the guys who boast to have “invented the spray-on tan,” “When applied, DHA [the main ingredient in most sunless tanners] reacts with proteins in the skin's superficial layer to form a golden brown color. Your skin begins to darken two to three hours after application and reaches its peak color within 24 hours. The color will gradually fade through natural exfoliation, just like a tan from the sun.”

The tan takes anywhere from 6 to 30 minutes to apply and costs from $17-$84. Depending on how much you shower and sweat, it lasts from 5 to 7 days.

But, just how natural does this faux tan look? “Even as brown and natural as they can get it, there’s always an orange tint to it,” Karla McKiernan, an aesthetician, said. “Also, it wears off the body in some places faster than others, like the palms of hands and fingers. The give-away signs are the knees, ankles, wrists and the knuckles.”

For those who choose to fake bake, Dermatologist Zoe D. Draelos, M.D. brought up some things to consider while speaking at the 64^th Annual Meeting of the American Academy of Dermatology. “It’s important to remember that a sunless tan provides no sun protection factor (SPF) whatsoever, so it’s important to use a broad spectrum (protects against UVA and UVB) sunscreen of at least sun SPF 15 when you are planning to be outside,” he said. (www.aad.org)

Also, make sure the person behind the spray gun blends the color in evenly over the skin, or things could get ugly. “I had it done once, and I left the beautician wanting to cry,” McKiernan said. “It was all white in here [pointing to her knuckles]. It looked horrible.”

It’s these scary statistics that sunless tanning salons cite to lure people into getting insta-tans. Like ministers spewing fire and brimstone, salons breathlessly champion the effects of their venom-less sun, spinning taglines such as, “Don’t risk wrinkles or skin cancer! Throw on a shower cap and stand in front of this spray can instead.”

Sure, spray tanning may be cutting the risk of cancer and lowering the number of leathery wrinkles one has to look forward to, but, is the quest to look sun-kissed worth having to say good-bye to Mr. Pride?

Regardless, the movement seems to be gaining momentum. Check out any celebrity magazine. There are more overly-bronzed, toxic looking waifs in them than you can shake a stick at. If the fad keeps up, legal forms may need to be revised to include a new “race” box to for people to check--orange.

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Kate Kowsh is a freelance writer and frequent contributor to Vyuz.com