Indoor Tanning Industry Fights Back
July 29, 2009 by Marijke Durning, RN
Filed under Diseases & Conditions
On the heels of this morning’s announcement that tanning beds are as carcinogenic as tobacco or asbestos, the Indoor Tanning Association is starting to fight back. Indoor Tanning Association President, Dan Humiston has taken the stand that medical warnings such as this morning’s (Tanning Beds Deemed High Cancer Risk) are scaremongering and will damage small businesses.
The association does acknowledge that ultraviolet can be dangerous. In an ad to appear in tomorrow’s New York Post, they say,
UV light from a tanning bed is the same as UV light from the sunshine, which has had the “group 1” classification since 1992.
But they add:
“Because tanning beds produce the same UV light as the sun, OVEREXPOSURE and abuse of our product—just like OVEREXPOSURE to sunlight—is associated with an increased risk for some types of skin cancer. Other items in this category are red wine and salted fish. Scientific studies suggest that drinking red wine or other alcoholic beverages carries a greater cancer risk than tanning. It is completely irresponsible to compare indoor tanning with mustard gas or arsenic as so many media reports today have done.”
What do you think? Do you tan this way? Are we just being scared away or is there something to this?
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Image: iStock.com
I can see his side of the argument. There’s a whole lot of bad things that as long as you do them in moderation, you can get by doing it. Its possible that tanning beds fall into that category. Most people that tan that I know of though, go crazy with it. It’s almost like an addictive drug to these people.
I do agree that people did respond “duh” when told that tanning beds cause cancer, but I don’t exactly think it was because its the same as the sun.
I wrote a blog about the association’s fight back as well, check it out at http://www.livinginshade.com/2009/08/indoor-tanning-association-fights-back/