Zinc, Breakouts & Your Skin Health
by Matt O'Connor, Certified Nutritionist & Founder of Honour Health
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If you have skin that's prone to breaking out, in this blog we're going to cover the role that zinc plays in our overall skin health.
And how a deficiency in zinc can often be part of the root cause of your skin breaking out.
What happens in a breakout
During a breakout, our skin is slowly building up a natural oil that's actually intended to protect our skin called sebum.
We all produce sebum, but when someone's skin is breaking out, they’re actually producing too much sebum.
Excess sebum can then block and clog the skin's pores.
Trapping dirt, bacteria and dead skin cells in the skin's pores.
Which then leads to what we see as a nice, big, beautiful pimple.
Being sarcastic, of course.
In essence, what's happening is our body's producing too much oil.
It's producing too much sebum, which is clogging our pores and breaking us out in pimples.
The role of Zinc
This is where zinc comes into play.
Zinc is an essential mineral, much like magnesium or iron, that we have to get into our body every day through the food we eat.
And one of the roles that zinc plays is actually helping regulate the amount of oil, the amount of sebum that our skin is producing.
If we're getting enough zinc in our diet, then our body produces sebum as it should.
It's not producing too much. It's not producing too little.
It's trying to produce just the right amount for your skin.
However, when you're deficient in zinc, your body actually struggles to regulate the amount of sebum that is being produced.
And this is where the main problem occurs, because the oil starts to build up.
You're producing too much.
Which can then lead to clogged pores.
And lead to what we're trying to avoid … a skin breakout.
Zinc deficiency can be part of the root cause
Now I'm not promising that if you rush out and you get more zinc into your diet through either food or supplements, that your skin is just going to miraculously improve.
There are obviously so many different factors and other areas of our lifestyle that can impact our overall skin health.
However, zinc does play a role in overall skin health and often why part of the root cause of skin issues can be related to a zinc deficiency.
At the end of this blog, I’ve detailed some of the foods that are most rich in zinc.
So you can start to understand whether you're getting enough zinc in your diet.
And if not, adding more of these foods would be the best place to start if you’re prone to having skin breakouts.
We have to get zinc in our diet everyday
Our body actually has no natural storage system for zinc, so it's important that we get enough zinc in our diet every single day.
If you struggle to get enough zinc in your diet through a whole food alone, then a high quality zinc supplement can be a great tool to ensure you're hitting 100% of your daily zinc needs.
Our preference is a high quality zinc glycinate supplement, because it's known for its high absorption.
And we recommend staying at a lower dose per day of around 10 to 15mg of elemental zinc per day.
This falls in line with how we naturally are getting zinc through food.
I wish I knew this earlier
I don't want to mislead you and think that zinc is some miracle cure that's going to fix all of your skin issues.
But what I wish I knew when I was younger was instead of trying to clear up my skin with the next cleanser or topical skin treatment, the better approach would have been starting with what's going on inside my body.
And making sure I was feeding my body with the nutrients I needed to support my overall skin health.
Foods high in Zinc
RDI = Recommended Dietary Intake (target amount you should be eating each day).
- Oysters (6 medium) – 32 mg zinc → 291% of RDI
- Beef steak, cooked (200 g) – 12 mg zinc → 109% of RDI
- Lamb, cooked (200 g) – 10 mg zinc → 91% of RDI
- Pumpkin seeds (handful / 30 g) – 2.2 mg zinc → 20% of RDI
- Cashews (handful / 30 g) – 1.6 mg zinc → 15% of RDI
- Chickpeas, cooked (1 cup / 164 g) – 2.5 mg zinc → 23% of RDI
- Lentils, cooked (1 cup / 200 g) – 2.5 mg zinc → 23% of RDI
- Almonds (handful / 30 g) – 1 mg zinc → 9% of RDI
- Cheddar cheese (50 g) – 1.5 mg zinc → 14% of RDI
- Egg (1 large) – 0.6 mg zinc → 5% of RDI
- Dark chocolate 85% (2 squares / 20 g) – 1.3 mg zinc → 12% of RDI
- Spinach, cooked (1 cup) – 1.4 mg zinc → 13% of RDI
The information provided here is for general informational purposes only & should not be considered as professional medical advice or a substitute for consulting with a healthcare provider. Always seek the advice of your physician or other qualified healthcare provider with any questions you may have regarding a medical condition.