CBS News98%
Doctor explains why bemotrizinol, a sunscreen ingredient, took so long to be authorized 75%
6/10/2026, 5:41:57 PM
BS Summary: This video contains 29 faulty reasoning types, including Halo Effect, Framing Effect, and Hasty Generalization, with Overconfidence Bias as the most egregious example at 20.1% saturation with 124 hits. Analysis detected 1,387 faulty-reasoning hits from 618 analyzed words, generating a BS Score of 66.8% and a BS Rank of 75% (5,559 of 21,887 videos). This video is worse (more manipulative) than 74.60% of the video peer group.
Summer's almost here and so is a new sunscreen ingredient.
This week, the Food and Drug Administration approved the chemical compound Beimotrizenol in sunscreen sold in the US.
This is the first time in more than 25 years the FDA has approved a new sunscreen ingredient,
but it's been widely used in sunscreens in Europe, Asia, and Australia for more than two decades.
It protects against both ultraviolet A and B rays and doesn't leave those white streaks associated with mineral-based sunscreens.
Products containing the compound will hit US stores later this year under the brand Parcel Shield.
CBS News medical correspondent Dr. Selen
Gounder joins us now.
She's also the editor at large for public health at KFF Health News.
So, doctor, why did it take so long for the FDA to approve this new ingredient?
So, the holdup was never really about safety.
It's that the system that we have to vet and approve these kinds of sunscreens is slow and clogged.
And what happened is Congress finally fixed this under the 2020 CARES Act.
So that was the big COVID relief bill.
You might remember this gave the FDA a faster process and the money to get it done more quickly.
Um so this is really about the law fixing things, not a lab breakthrough.
And this was something that happened under more than one White House, both the Biden and the
Trump administration.
Uh, dermatologists and skin cancer activists pushed for this for over a decade.
And this had bipartisan support.
>> Wow. And to think that bureaucracy is what held it up for so long.
I mean, is this ingredient better than what's already on our shelves?
>> So, in a few different ways.
So, first of all, it gives you stronger protection against the deep UVA rays which cause skin aging, increases your risk for skin cancer.
A lot of the older US sunscreens are weaker on that front.
Um, in addition, the common filters and sunscreens we've had to date uh break down in the sun and lose their strength.
This one is very stable and it holds its protection longer.
It actually helps keep some of the other ingredients from breaking down too.
And it barely soaks into the skin, so it stays on the surface.
There's no hormonal effects,
which there's been some concerns with some of the other um sunscreens that we use.
use.
and it feels light.
So ultimately, whatever sunscreen people will wear is actually the most important thing.
>> Yeah.
So, it's not going to be available until later this year.
So, what should people be doing in the meantime?
>> Well, in the meantime, keep using the sunscreens we have.
Uh SPF 30 or more.
Reapply every two hours.
I'd be careful about some of what's trending on social media right now.
There's this SPF skepticism about do we really need to be uh putting sunscreen and so on on um
don't trust everything you see on social media.
There's a good reason for that.
Um the theme of your hitch lately.
>> I know right.
Uh and skin cancer is the most common cancer in the country.
So this is really something worth protecting against.
>> Really quickly this is only going to be marketed under one product name.
Why is that?
Uh there's one company that has exclusive rights to it for now, but that it will be expiring before too long.
So just for the, you know, first year or
so, uh it'll be under that one brand name.
>> Okay, Dr. ly got her.
Thanks so much.
Analysis
Hover over highlighted words in the article to view the associated bias or fallacy analysis.