For more than a decade Jackie Marshall had visited a tanning salon to go on a sunbed before she went on holiday abroad. She thought these short visits, two or three times a year, would give her a ‘base tan’ and help stop her pale Scottish skin burning in the Mediterranean sun.
In fact, these sessions were more than doubling her chances of contracting the deadliest form of skin cancer — malignant melanoma.
At the age of just 35, she was diagnosed with the disease on her back and underwent radical surgery. Sixteen years later, she is still fighting the disease she thought a base tan would help prevent.
As Jackie, a pensions administrator who lives on Merseyside, explains: ‘I didn’t abuse sunbeds, but I always had a few sessions before going on holiday when I was in my late teens and 20s.
‘I’m really pale — I’m originally from Greenock in Scotland and everyone in the family has moles and freckles. I thought having a base tan would stop me burning when I went abroad,’ says the mother-of-one.
More... Do you think only men get heart disease? It kills more women than breast cancer Jaundice: The horrifying story every new parent must read
But even with a base tan, Jackie still burned on holiday — despite putting on sun cream. ‘The first time I went abroad, I bought the most expensive sun cream I could find — but back then it was probably only factor seven or so.’
Jackie is one of many thousands who wrongly believe using sunbeds to get a base tan acts as extra protection for sunbathing on holiday.
Fourteen per cent of women who use sunbeds before going away say they do so to avoid burning on holiday, according to a recent survey by travel agency sunshine.co.uk.
But using a sunbed once before the age of 35 more than doubles your risk of getting melanoma, according to a review of 13 different studies, published in the British Medical Journal last July.
The idea of a base-tan protecting your skin, it’s claimed, is a myth. ‘It’s nonsense,’ says Professor Harry Moseley, spokesman for the British Association of Dermatologists.
‘The process of acquiring a tan damages the skin — the skin is going brown to protect itself.’
When Jackie first noticed that a mole on her lower back had changed in colour and size, she went to her GP.
‘I spotted it in a changing room and thought: “I don’t like the look of that.” It looked multi-coloured and was definitely bigger than it was a few months earlier. But it wasn’t itchy or sore.’
Her GP sent her to a dermatologist, who diagnosed a melanoma — and then asked: ‘Do you use sunbeds?’
Most skin cancers are a result of over-exposure to UV light. Melanoma is one of the most aggressive forms, and can spread rapidly to other organs.
Bursts of UV rays from sunbeds may be up to ten to 15 times stronger than the Mediterranean midday sun, dermatologists claimAlmost 13,000 Britons are diagnosed with it each year, making it the fifth most common cancer after breast, lung, prostate and bowel cancer, according to Cancer Research.
Melanoma is the fastest-increasing cancer in men and the second fastest-increasing cancer in women.
This rise is blamed largely on cheap package holidays and the arrival of sunbeds in the UK in the Seventies — people in their 60s and 70s are over five times more likely to be diagnosed with melanoma than their parents were.More people are also now dying as a result — melanoma is responsible for the deaths of around 2,200 people in the UK every year (double the rate of what it was in the late Seventies).
After her melanoma was diagnosed, Jackie — whose daughter, Hannah, was then just six — had surgery to remove the mole and five years later, aged 40, she was given the all-clear. She never went near sunbeds again.
But when she was 45, the cancer returned, in the form of a lump under the three-inch scar left by the previous operation.
This time Jackie needed radical surgery to remove a huge slab of skin, which left her with a 13-inch scar running from her spine to her hip. A year later she found a lump in her groin — the cancer had spread again, this time to her lymphatic system, which runs throughout the body.
Jackie needed the lymph nodes in her groin and pelvis removed to reduce the chance of the cancer spreading through her body.
As well as the scar, the operation has left Jackie with lymphoedema — swelling caused by the build-up of fluid as a result of damage to the lymph system — in one leg.
She’s since had various lumps removed, though thankfully has been clear of cancer for five years.
‘I always worry about it coming back. I was clear for ten years after finding the first mole and it still returned. And now I’m at even greater risk because it reached my lymph nodes,’ she says.
Many people with paler skin think getting a tan will provide them the same protection that people with dark skin have. Dark skin has higher levels of melanin, the pigment which absorbs UV rays and causes you to tan — and as a result it tans faster and tends not to burn.
People with pale skin take much longer to tan, so they have to expose their skin to damaging UV rays for longer.
Those with red hair and freckles also have a different type of melanin in their skin — phaeomelanin, rather than eumelanin — which is less able to cope with UV rays. When you expose your skin to the ultra-violet rays emitted by the sun or sunbed lamps you risk damaging skin cells.
Damaged cells are more likely to mutate and divide uncontrollably because the affected cells are no longer receiving the signal telling them to stop multiplying — this is what causes cancer.
Because sunbed sessions typically last from eight to 12 minutes, users believe they are unlikely to do themselves any damage. But eight to 12 minutes on a sunbed isn’t the same as sunbathing for that time on a beach.
The short, sharp bursts of UV rays given off by sunbed lamps may be up to ten to 15 times stronger than the Mediterranean midday sun, according to the British Association of Dermatologists.
Researchers at the University of Dundee found that nine in ten sunbeds on the High Street break safety rules on the UV rays they should emit.
And just one session could be dangerous. The review of 13 studies suggested each sunbed session increases a person’s risk of melanoma by 1.8 per cent, and if you’re naturally pale, a red-head or have a lot of moles, the risk is even higher.
Yet, worryingly, the same review found that sunbed users are more likely to have fair skin, red or blonde hair and freckles.
Furthermore, lulled into a false sense of security, many who use sunbeds then use sunscreen with an SPF lower than 15 (the minimum recommended by Cancer Research — pale-skinned people should use at least SPF 30), or even forego suncream altogether.
Wendy Butterworth, 40, used factor 15 on holiday after her sunbed sessions. She used to go on a sunbed five or six times before every holiday and during her teens even clubbed together with her sister to buy a second-hand sunbed.
‘I’m pale and covered in moles and freckles and I always burned,’ she says. ‘Using sunbeds was my way of trying to get a nice, even tan. I was convinced it would harden my skin to the sun and I’d get a healthy tan, but it never happened. I’d use factor 15 and still burn.’
Last year, she discovered a strange pink mole on her forearm, which turned out to be a melanoma.
Although the mole itself was just 5mm, to ensure they got all the cancer cells, doctors were forced to cut out a huge chunk of skin, leaving her with 39 stitches.
Wendy, who has two stepchildren, says: ‘I’m all-clear now, but every time a lump pops up, I’m completely paranoid and worry before each three-month check-up.’
She is currently taking a year off work and living in Spain with her husband John to recover from the diagnosis and treatment.
‘I’m so careful now. I wear factor 50, a hat, sunglasses, cover up and stay out of the sun when it is at its strongest. But if I hadn’t been diagnosed I’d probably still be cooking myself on sunbeds.’
