When the mercury climbed into the 80s for the first time yesterday, many students peeled off the layers of winter to reveal a sure-fire sign of the sunless season: pale skin.
And though tanning beds may be the quickest way to go from ghostly white to golden brown, the American Academy of Dermatology recently linked the beds to many long-term health problems, including skin cancer and eye damage.
A study published in the British Journal of Cancer found tanning beds increase the risk of melanoma, a serious form of skin cancer, by 300 percent for people who use tanning beds occasionally and by 800 percent for those who use tanning beds more than 10 times a year.
Despite these frightening numbers, Melanie Wigmanich of Tanning Etc. in Kenmore Square, said the store continues to draw a lot of business, especially with summer burgeoning.
“Tons of people come in all the time. It’s a diverse group of people,” she said, adding most of their clientele aren’t one-time visitors but people who buy package deals. The eight-session package is the most popular.
Wegmanich did not display concern about the study’s results, and she didn’t think studies linking tanning beds to skin cancer would hurt business.
“People don’t care,” Wigmanich said.
Though the tanning industry is booming, the American Medical Association and the AAD have even urged action that would ban the sale and use of tanning equipment for non-medical purposes.
The Department of Health and Human services recognizes tanning beds and sun lamps as a “known human carcinogen,” meaning they are known as direct sources of cancer.
Malgorzata Pyc, a sophomore in the School of Management, has heard the warnings before, but has used tanning beds in the past. Before she went home to Arizona last summer, she visited a tanning salon 10 times.
“I’m used to being tan and I felt sickly and pale,” Pyc said. “I knew I’d be wearing a bathing suit right away and I wanted to get a head start.”
While Pyc said the information linking skin cancer to tanning beds is frightening, she said she puts it in the back of her mind and isn’t planning on making a habit of visiting tanning salons.
“I guess it’s frightening, but I’m young. I’m not too worried about [getting cancer] because back home I was in the sun all the time,” Pyc said.
Aaron Ansel, a freshman at Emerson College, has also used tanning beds in the past in order to keep a tan through the winter. While he said the study was startling, he questioned the study’s data.
“I don’t know,” Ansel said. “With studies like that, you have to look at the statistics. Those are the people who fry themselves in the summer without using sunscreen.
“It may affect me a little.”
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