# Is there a medication that will darken the skin? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [August 19, 2008, 3:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-a-medication-that-will-darken-the-skin/460521 "2008-08-19T03:54:54Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 7\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![md2000](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/73ab20/32.png) [@md2000](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/md2000)\ **Post date:** [January 8, 2016, 2:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-a-medication-that-will-darken-the-skin/460521/21 "2016-01-08T14:10:43Z")
> [@Annie-Xmas](#): > > **AMG** are we related? I have Native American ancestors, and my older brother is very dark, yet I am as pale as a non-albino person can be. I tell my brother that he used up all the Native genes. Interestingly, I saw a play and then an interview with the playwriter, who was native. Apparently northern aboriginals can have a wide variation of skin tone, and the play depicted life on a northern reserve in Canada, where some Cree(?) would use the description “nigger” to refer to fellow aboriginals who were darker. (They did have TV there…) Even though, most of the people on an isolated reserve share the same gene pool there was a noticeable skin variation, apparently. ---
**Author:** ![TriPolar](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tripolar/32/3008_2.png) [@TriPolar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TriPolar)\ **Post date:** [January 8, 2016, 2:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-a-medication-that-will-darken-the-skin/460521/22 "2016-01-08T14:24:57Z")
Some have claimed that if you eat a lot of beta carotene you’ll turn orange. The idea being with some minimal tanning you’ll end up with a fairly dark skin. I have no idea if that works or if that much beta carotene is bad for you. ---
**Author:** ![pool](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/pool/32/4152_2.png) [@pool](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pool)\ **Post date:** [January 8, 2016, 2:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-a-medication-that-will-darken-the-skin/460521/23 "2016-01-08T14:30:18Z")
Apparently thousands of people in the UK use something called Melanotan II [https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Melanotan\_II](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Melanotan_II) It’s something you inject I’m not sure if it works but there are some really frightening before and after pictures online of the stuff if you google it, it appears that maybe it does work, but it hasn’t been proven safe and who knows maybe it will give those people full body melanoma a few years from now. Oh and it apparently it has a side effect of causing raging boners! ---
**Author:** ![botsgotme](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/91b2a8/32.png) [@botsgotme](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/botsgotme)\ **Post date:** [January 8, 2016, 2:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-a-medication-that-will-darken-the-skin/460521/24 "2016-01-08T14:58:17Z")
Why not some kind of long lasting skin dye? that should be a safe way of doing it. ---
**Author:** ![engineer\_comp\_geek](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/engineer_comp_geek/32/504_2.png) [@engineer\_comp\_geek](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/engineer_comp_geek)\ **Post date:** [January 8, 2016, 4:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-a-medication-that-will-darken-the-skin/460521/25 "2016-01-08T16:49:42Z")
> [@TriPolar](#): > > Some have claimed that if you eat a lot of beta carotene you’ll turn orange. The idea being with some minimal tanning you’ll end up with a fairly dark skin. I have no idea if that works or if that much beta carotene is bad for you. I’ve seen pictures of people who have eaten ungodly numbers of carrots just to see if it turns their skin orange. It does, but based on the pictures of folks that have done it, if you are expecting to turn orange like a traffic cone you will be very disappointed. It’s more of a kinda orange-ish kinda yellow-ish hue that makes you look a bit jaundiced, IMHO. I can’t find it now (it may be long gone from the internet) but someone posted daily pictures for a month, and after 30 days their skin was noticeably a different color, though the results weren’t what I would call dramatic. If you are trying to get darker skin, I wouldn’t consider the orange-ish skin produced from carrot overload to be a step in the right direction. There are a lot of fake pics on the internet. I don’t know the origins of this one, but it does look like a fairly accurate depiction of the skin color change you can expect. [https://slendergrapefruit.files.wordpress.com/2013/08/img\_20130811\_193929\_7301.jpg](https://slendergrapefruit.files.wordpress.com/2013/08/img_20130811_193929_7301.jpg) ---
**Author:** ![Shagnasty](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9dc877/32.png) [@Shagnasty](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shagnasty)\ **Post date:** [January 8, 2016, 5:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-a-medication-that-will-darken-the-skin/460521/26 "2016-01-08T17:26:46Z")
There is such a thing as tanning pills. They work mostly like eating a ton of carrots but they contain mixed carotenoids so the color may be a little better. I am not saying the results will be great and look all that natural but they are harmless as far as I know. > **[Amazon.com : MyTan Bronze Tanning Pills | 100 Softgels | Sunless Tan Supplement...](https://www.amazon.com/MyTan-Tanning-Softgels-Carotene-Sunless/dp/B00JGORVV2)** > > Amazon.com : MyTan Bronze Tanning Pills | 100 Softgels | Sunless Tan Supplement | With Astaxanthin Lutein Lycopene And More | Over 7-Week Supply : Health & Household Spray tans (the kind you get in a spa booth) work fairly well too but you have to reapply them fairly frequently and they do have a distinctive smell for a while. ---
**Author:** ![Blue\_Blistering\_Barnacle](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/blue_blistering_barnacle/32/3386_2.png) [@Blue\_Blistering\_Barnacle](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Blue_Blistering_Barnacle)\ **Post date:** [January 8, 2016, 9:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-a-medication-that-will-darken-the-skin/460521/27 "2016-01-08T21:24:50Z")
> [@LiveOnAPlane](#): > > I don’t know what was used, but there was a long-ago nonfiction book called “Black Like Me” where a Caucasian guy took something that made his skin as dark as an African-American’s and he wrote about his experiences. It was a very interesting read, but I don’t remember what was used. > > It must have been pretty effective, though, and maybe this will give you a starting place. > > ETA: I found it on Wikipedia– I read the beginning of that book- IIRC he was not satisfied with the results of medication and UV, so he stained his skin with walnut juice. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-a-medication-that-will-darken-the-skin/460521.md?page=1)