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Old 05-31-2004, 11:46 AM   #1 (permalink)
Pale and Proud
 
Join Date: May 31 2004
Posts: 2
Rep Power: 0 Pale and Proud is on a distinguished road
I foudn this site in advertisement on another site and was just digusted. With all the information about skin cancer out there how you can willing expose yourself to ultra"violent" rays. What is so great about being tan? I don't get it. And to those of you who own tanning salons, how you sleep at night knowing your making money off of someone getting melanoma and dying? I hold this issue very close to my heart since I have a family friend who at age 29 died of melanoma. She used baby oil and very low spf and went to tanning salons. And she paid for it with her life. I don't plan on being an active member on these boards I just needed to share this information with you. I am 16, probab;y the age where most people use tanning salons. This is an article I wrote for my school (OLL, lourdes) newspaper The name of my friend has not been changed. You can go to www.recordonline.com and find her obituary if you think this is a joke. There is so much better things in life then being tan, and I personally don't even think a tank looks good. I hope you all change your ways. This is reality and you are all being ignorant. Don't think it won't happen to you because it can. You are not invincible.

Melissa Bambino graduated from our rival Cornwall High School. She attended the University of Notre Dame and worked for Teen Vogue Magazine. On December 29, 2003, just 11 years after her graduation from high school, her obituary appeared in the newspaper. The cause of death was melanoma: a fatal type of skin cancer acquired from exposure to the sun, sun lamps, and tanning beds. She was 29.

For a long time tanning beds were believed to be a safer way to sport that “awesome” glowing look. However, medical evidence has found that the use of tanning beds are actually more dangerous than baking in the actual sun. There are two types of Ultra-Violet rays in the sun, UVA and UVB rays. UVB rays are what cause sun burn. Tanning beds have less UVB rays which is why you don’t get burned, and the reason they are believed safe. However, they contain 10-15% more UVA rays which penetrate deeper into the skin and cause permanent and possibly fatal damage.

A person’s best defense against melanoma, as well as other type of skin cancers, (half of all new cancers are skin cancers) is to avoid tanning beds completely and to wear a minimum of SPF (sun protection factor) 30 sunscreen. Reapply the sunscreen every two hours. Though tanning beds are very dangerous, the actual sun is also. Only 30% of Lourdes students wear the recommended SPF while sunbathing. It only takes one blistering sunburn in your lifetime to double your chances of getting cancer. 45% of Lourdes students have had a blistering sunburn. And just because you are not a blue eyed blond, or a green eyed red head doesn’t mean you are off the hook! While it is true that Caucasians are 20-40% more likely to develop skin cancer then African Americans are, no one is risk free. The most common African melanomas occur on the soles of the feet, palms of the hands, and under the nails.

Melanoma usually presents itself as a strange mole which changes in shape or color. If you have a suspicious mole, it is best to have it checked out by a dermatologist before the problem becomes worse. Melanoma is curable only during the earliest stages, while the melanoma is thin. The thicker the melanoma, the lower the survival rate.

. Melanoma is one of the most common forms of skin cancer, as well as the deadliest, because it easily spreads to other parts of the body. The treatment of melanoma includes chemotherapy, lymph node removal, radiation to the brain, skin grafts, biopsies, mole removal etc. These treatments are very painful and have a variety of side effects such as hair loss.

Aside from cancer, there is another risk of using tanning beds and sunbathing unprotected. This risk affects your looks, which is probably the reason you want to be tan in the first place. The sun causes your skin, especially on your face to prematurely wrinkle. Those who expose themselves to UV rays will look about 10-15 years older then they really are. This generally starts to occur in the mid-twenties.

Teens have become dangerously devoted to tanning. 22% of the OLL students surveyed have admitted to using a tanning bed at least once. Most teens do not take the risks seriously, and believe that it “won’t happen to me”. I have a friend who told me I could come to her funeral when I warned her about what she was doing to her body by
going tanning.
There is one way to sport that “awesome” glow without exposing yourself to any type of ultraviolet rays. Sunless tanning has become more and more popular, as the death rate of skin cancer has gone up. You can buy a sunless tanning lotion at drugstores and beauty shops and apply it yourself. The other option is to go to a salon and have them spray you with the tanning solution , as if you are taking a shower. The latter is probably the easier way to go as you won’t have to worry about brown palms, or finger streaks. Many salons in the area now offer “ airbrush ” or “mystic” tanning. Look in your local phone book for more information.

It is expected that this year over 1 million people will be diagnosed with various forms of skin cancer. About 8,000 of those people will die. Don’t become a statistic, sport your natural skin tone now, and at your OLL class reunion in the years to come you will be cancer and wrinkle free!

Pale and Proud

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