Sunbed poster sparks row

POSTER PROBLEM: The controversial tanning salon advertisement

Relevant offers

A controversial advertisement in tanning salons throughout Palmerston North claims sunbeds can help prevent several types of cancer.

But the posters fail to mention the beds can also lead to the deadliest form of the disease – melanoma.

And the Cancer Society is outraged at the claims as it calls for all tanning booths to be banned.

The advertisement put out by Super Tan sunbed distributors says tanning is a great way to get vitamin D, which helps prevent breast cancer, colon and ovarian cancer – among others.

Manawatu Cancer Society sunsmart co-ordinator Kerry Hocquard said the poster is dangerously misleading and preyed on people's fear of vitamin D deficiency.

People can also get Vitamin D from some foods such as oily fish, eggs and meat, or fortified foods, such as margarine and some milk products.

Sunbeds have been labelled as "carcinogenic to humans" by the International Agency for Research on Cancer, alongside tobacco, asbestos and arsenic, she said.

But the company that created the poster does not believe it has been misleading.

Managing director Kirsty Ethynes said there has been so much negativity about sunbeds and about cancer that she wanted to share the benefits.

"People do not need to be scared off by sunbeds if they use them in moderation."

Sales of sunbeds had dropped dramatically following campaigns by the Cancer Society, she said.

"Yet melanoma rates haven't dropped. So how do they explain that?"

Aorangi Hospital dermatologist and vitamin D researcher Dr Louise Reiche said the poster was misleading because people produced vitamin D in their system more efficiently from natural light than from under ultraviolet lamps.

It is absorbed best when produced outside exercising because it flows through your system as opposed to when you are just lying still sunbathing, she said.

"The poster promotes using a lot of carcinogenic toxins on the hope of producing some health benefits when the proof is not there."

People can get their daily recommended dose of vitamin D by exposing themselves to just a quarter of the dose of sunlight that would make you go light pink, she said.

So for a light-skinned person it would be about three minutes in the sun in summer, outside the peak sunshine hours between 11am and 4pm.

Research by Niwa found the intensity of radiation in some tanning booths in New Zealand was several times higher than ever occurs in sunlight.

Dr Richard McKenzie said by using sunbeds, we expose ourselves to unknown risks.

"Our skins may not be able to cope well with this sort of stress."

The Indoor Tanning Association said New Zealanders needed to stop being afraid of the sun and start respecting it by applying common sense.

Nationally, skin cancers are the most common type of cancer, at around 70,000 new cases each year, including around 2000 cases of melanoma.

In 2006, there were 287 deaths from melanoma and 102 from non-melanoma skin cancers.

New Zealand has the highest death rates for both melanoma and non-melanoma skin cancers in the world.

- © Fairfax NZ News