The foundation informs RTL News that. “If you want to reduce the risk of cancer, it is better to limit the use of these devices or not to use them,” says a spokesperson. The Antoni van Leeuwenhoek hospital also informs RTL Nieuws in a response that it is ‘advisable to be careful with the regular use of nail dryers’.
Gel nailpolish
What’s the problem? Many people in the Netherlands apply a new color of gel nail polish to their nails every few weeks. At a nail salon, or they get started with their own jar of lacquer. To dry the nails, a nail dryer is always used with gel polish. This is a lamp that often uses UV light.
And that UV light is harmful. Recent research by the University of California San Diego shows that nail dryers with UV light damage skin cells. This increases the risk of skin cancer in the investigation published in the renowned scientific journal Nature Communications.
Cells died
For the study, scientists exposed human and mouse cells to the radiation from the nail polish lamps. When the cells were exposed to the UV light from the lamp for 20 minutes, about 30 percent of the cells died. Some cells that did survive suffered damage to their DNA. That damage was comparable to the damage people have with melanoma, a form of skin cancer.
Although the scientists concluded that the cell damage is worrying, they do not yet prove that UV lamps cause cancer with certainty. Cells in a laboratory are more vulnerable to damage than cells on a person’s hand. In addition, in a nail salon, or while drying at home, you only sit with your hand under a lamp for a few minutes.
KWF: ‘There are risks’
Nevertheless, the KWF Cancer Control says in a response to RTL Nieuws that this research makes it clear that there are risks associated with the use of UV nail dryers. “More scientific research is needed to find out exactly how much the risk of cancer from using these devices is and whether you can safely use UV nail polish dryers if only a few times a year.”
The Antoni van Leeuwenhoek hospital also says that the degree of exposure to UV light in nail dryers should be considered. “But using nail dryers leads to extra unprotected exposure to UV light anyway,” says dermatologist Yannick Elshot of the hospital. “UVA light is used in nail polish dryers. Although UVB is largely responsible for DNA damage, UVA light also (indirectly) leads to DNA damage, which can cause cancer. In this case, skin cancer.”
KWF Cancer Control believes it is especially important that users of the nail dryers are already aware that UV light can be carcinogenic.
Dryers on offer
The question is whether users are aware of this. The nail dryers do appear in an advertising brochure every few weeks. For example, such a dryer is currently for sale at the Action retail chain for the offer price of less than 10 euros. And at the end of last year, the dryer was still in the folder at Aldi for about 18 euros.
There was no small print saying: ‘Caution, possibly carcinogenic.’ In the user manual of most devices, often dozens of pages, you can read that ‘UV rays can lead to damage to the eyes and skin, such as aging and in extreme cases even to skin cancer’.
