Legislators Combat Melanoma, Restrict Teen Tanning

Extract

Young teens would be banned from indoor tanning beds and older teens would need their parents' permission, under a law proposed in Massachusetts.

The state is just one of many that have banned or restricted indoor tanning for teenagers. California, Texas, New Jersey, North Carolina, and New Hampshire have recently passed bills, bringing to 25 the number of states that have placed some restriction on minors' access to tanning beds. Legislators, with the support of local and national cancer advocacy groups, have passed the bills seeking to limit skin cancer risk. But opponents in the industry say that parents should be able to decide whether their children can visit tanning beds and that restricting tanning may limit teens' exposure to vitamin D, which has been associated with lower risk of some cancers.

“What we're seeing is a grassroots effort in many states to bring to the fore the problem of UV as a carcinogen,” says Allan C. Halpern, M.D., of Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center in New York. “In so doing, we're targeting an important subset, the teen population where tanning is very common and a significant concern because of its potential for raising cancer rates in these children at a later age.”