A sunscreen scandal heats up in Australia.

Live from the UK, this is the Marketplace Morning Report from the BBC World Service.

I'm William Lee Adams. Good morning.

We start in Australia where regulators have pulled 18 sunscreen products from the shelves over safety concerns.

It followed testing by a consumer group that showed dozens of

sunscreen products, including some by major global brands, did not offer the SBF claimed.

Australia has the highest rate of skin cancers in the world, and two out of three Australians

will have at least one instance in their lifetime. It also has some of the strictest

sunscreen regulations globally.

Here's the BBC's Katie Silver with more, Katie Hi.

Hi.

So this all dates back to research that came out in June. What's the story?

So this was absolutely shocking in Australia. Back in June, Choice, which is a consumer advocacy group,

did some research where they basically conducted

lab tests on a series of sunscreens and found that a shocking majority of them failed to

have the SPF or the sun protection factor that was advertised on the label. So one of them

said that it had SBF 50. It actually was found to have just four

in the tests. Is this likely to have an impact on other countries or other companies around the world?

Yes, so that research came out in June. Now we're hearing for the medicines regulator

warning about 20 more sunscreens, basically saying they've all come from this same base

formula.

Now, Australia is a massive sunscreen exporter as well.

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