The case against indoor tanning just became stronger on a global scale. The United Nations’ respected international health agency, The World Health Organization (WHO), has issued an official statement calling for nations everywhere to ban sunbed use for individuals under age 18, and to impose more stringent regulations restricting tanning machine use for people of all ages.

WHO’s warning was spurred by studies demonstrating “the direct link between the use of sunbeds and cancer.” It also echoed the U.S. federal government’s 2003 Report on Carcinogens, which for the first time officially listed ultraviolet radiation (UVR) from both sunshine and tanning machines as a “known human carcinogen.”

Timing Is Everything

WHO timed its recommendations to appear in spring, when many young people — “especially young women in developed countries” — start tanning indoors for a head start on summer. “For years, concern has been growing that people, above all teenage women, are using sunbeds to acquire a tan, which is considered socially attractive,” said Kerstin Leitner, PhD, WHO’s Assistant Director-General for Environmental Health. “The consequence has been a calamitous rise in skin cancers. And we know that young people burnt by UV have a greater risk of later developing melanoma, the deadliest form of skin cancer.”

The agency’s fears about young people are well-founded: In a study of more than 10,000 teens across the U.S., 34 percent of 17-year-old girls and nearly 25 percent between ages 15 and 18 said they regularly used sunbeds. A Canadian study found that tanning salons were admitting children as young as eight.

The Truth Emerges

Tanning salon owners have long argued that sunbeds are safe because they deliver controlled doses of UVR, and because they mainly produce UVA radiation, which had been deemed safer than the sun’s burning UVB rays. Both arguments have taken a beating of late. Last year, a major Australian-U.S. study showed that UVA may be as damaging as UVB — perhaps more damaging on the genetic level. Furthermore, many studies have linked tanning machines to both melanoma and nonmelanoma skin cancers. And numerous reports have shown that the “control” over sunbed use in tanning salons is loose, with no real enforcement of national, state, or local regulations — when such regulations exist. Some sunbeds emit UVR levels many times stronger than those produced by the midday summer sun in most countries, WHO noted.

WHO’s report maintained that sunbeds should be used only in rare, specific cases, such as for treatment of dermatitis and psoriasis; this should always be under qualified medical supervision in an approved medical clinic.

“WHO wants to make it clear that melanomas and other skin cancers are often the consequence of failing to take proper precautions,” noted Dr. Leitner. “We hope that our recommendations will inspire regulatory authorities worldwide to formulate and reinforce laws to better control sunbed use, such as banning all unsupervised operations.”