Want To Get Cancer? Use A Tanning Bed

Skin cancer is on the rise. Researchers at the Mayo Clinic have discovered a stunning increase in the rates of skin cancer in people under age 40, especially in women. Their findings, published inMayo Clinic Proceedings, show that since the 1970s the rate of melanoma among young women has gone up eightfold. In young men, the rate has climbed fourfold.

“A recent study reported that people who use indoor tanning beds frequently are 74 percent more likely to develop melanoma, and we know young women are more likely to use them than young men,” says Jerry Brewer, M.D., a Mayo Clinic dermatologist. Despite abundant information about the dangers of tanning beds, he adds, young women continue to use them.

“The results of this study emphasize the importance of active interventions to decrease risk factors for skin cancer and, in particular, to continue to alert young women that indoor tanning has carcinogenic effects that increase the risk of melanoma,” adds Brewer.